Tales from the PUG Stone

[Solarman]

Tauren Druid. Moonkin/Tree, 5.75k/5.4k GS respectively. Got m'self my 4T10, now I just need more of the Vanquisher tokens to drop (they've been very, very rare the last few weeks.) Raid progression - 25m we're on Sindragosa, 10m one of my guild's groups is working on the Lich King, though I was only in the 10m groups enough to get through Plague wing and almost down Blood Queen when she came out. Since then I've been relegated to shepherding alts or jumping in late when people can't make the second (or the rare third) night for their group.

Older raids - ToGC10/25 I've done 4/5, though guildies have done Anub on 10. Ulduar - 25, downed all normal modes and at least one hardmode (can't remember, don't feel like checking), 10 downed all normal modes and most hard modes. None of the people who've got the quest to do Algalon wanted to do him, though.

 

[violinmana]

Tauren Druid. Moonkin/Tree, 5.75k/5.4k GS respectively. Got m'self my 4T10, now I just need more of the Vanquisher tokens to drop (they've been very, very rare the last few weeks.) Raid progression - 25m we're on Sindragosa, 10m one of my guild's groups is working on the Lich King, though I was only in the 10m groups enough to get through Plague wing and almost down Blood Queen when she came out. Since then I've been relegated to shepherding alts or jumping in late when people can't make the second (or the rare third) night for their group.

Older raids - ToGC10/25 I've done 4/5, though guildies have done Anub on 10. Ulduar - 25, downed all normal modes and at least one hardmode (can't remember, don't feel like checking), 10 downed all normal modes and most hard modes. None of the people who've got the quest to do Algalon wanted to do him, though.

My guild raids ICC10 at Saturday, 2PM server time. We usually have only 4-5 people show up, so if you want to ask your guild about alts and what-not, we can have a raid that's consisted of only [Famous Players] and [Team Sportscoat].

We usually have a Tankadin, a Enhance/Resto Shaman, a Holy Priest, and a DK DPS on. We usually don't get far, but we down Saurfang pretty much every week, since it practically is a PUG raid.

You know, just askin.

 

[Shirotsume]

Uh, the rating thing I was talking about *is* for dps. I'm a tank, and I never roll with pug healers anyway.

As for 5k-5.4k, icc10 takes nothing to raid, so I'm not counting it.

My point is, people who do no raids, low raids, or irregular raids, are generally around 5k-5.4k gs as dps, and generally can't play for crap. 5.4K+ GS dps generally consistently raid every week with the same people to get the extra gear, and generally work better with a group and understand tactics a tad better.

Although I agree that GS is no substitute for looking at skill, you can with good accuracy figure out what DPS you're going to need to watch and be ready for with taunts/cds etc.

Also, from 5k to 5.4k, it's an exponential increase in skill, most times. 5.4k is always a shit ton better than 5k, and the increase in skill 5.3k-5.4k is far larger than 5k-5.2k.

 

[byakuryuu]

I don't complain about GearScore. I don't use the Mod myself (Elitist Group for me), but from my experience:

1. Avoid people in more than two pieces of Tier 9 Conquest; these people likely have little to moderate experience with Raiding/Holding their roles down and have even more likely just farmed lower level Heroics.

2. People from RP Realms. If they're Tanks or Healers, you're in trouble. If they're DPS, they won't make a difference. Feathermoon <US> is a prime example of a realm full of Tanks/Healers with little to no sense. The record before my Transfer to Barthilas with this realm's Healers/Tanks in my pugs is 0/12 Dungeon Clears. Seriously, I could put out more threat in BC.

3. Don't pug raid with people you don't at least 80% trust. I'm talking about those 3k DPS Rogues and those idiots who insist on Raiding in PvP Gear.

 

[akun50]

I'm largely rolling Horde, with an 80 BE DK as my current main.

I enjoy playing my level 69 BE Priestess when I'm running in a group, though I'm hating having to solo with her. >.<

I also have a level 26 Forsaken Warlock I'm intermitently leveling, but only because she's my jewelcrafter alt.

I've got got a level 60 human Paladin that I play on occasion to get some different perspective on a lot of the quests, and a level 41 Dwarven Priestess.

I've also got a number of... well, right now, trash alts. I don't want to delete them, but I'm probably not going to be rolling them anytime soon.

 

[FinalMax]

Main's a Human Rogue named Kalvit. Combat Swords main spec/Mutilate second spec. Gave him the simple Skinning/Leatherworking combo for professions. Ended up moving to Caelestrasz recently so a friend of mine would still have friends he knows on the same server.

Got a Draenai Shammy I've recently started up on. Got it decked in three heirloom pieces to speed things along as I try to build up an enhancement shammy. Put Herb and Inscription as professions.

Got some others I've still got to work on (DK and a second Rogue), but I've mainly been building up my gold reserves for Cataclysm. Still got to get myself in an ICC or ToC/ToGC run some time.

 

[Belgarion213]

Main's a Human Rogue named Kalvit.? Combat Swords main spec/Mutilate second spec.? Gave him the simple Skinning/Leatherworking combo for professions.? Ended up moving to Caelestrasz recently so a friend of mine would still have friends he knows on the same server.

Got a Draenai Shammy I've recently started up on.? Got it decked in three heirloom pieces to speed things along as I try to build up an enhancement shammy.? Put Herb and Inscription as professions.

Got some others I've still got to work on (DK and a second Rogue), but I've mainly been building up my gold reserves for Cataclysm.? Still got to get myself in an ICC or ToC/ToGC run some time.

Wow, were on the same server though I'm horde side.

EDIT: At the moment my 'main' is a 80 BE DK that I'm running around, really he should be raiding but I never really find the time other than some pug runs, our raiding team in the guild sort of fell apart a while ago when the Raid Leader had his account hacked.

Got my Shammy to level 80 the other week so am slowly gearing him up to a decent level. At the moment leveling a Orc Warlock (at level 20 at the moment) to be my herb/alchemist.

My DK is a pure gatherer (haven't changed him from when he was my only really playd alt and the bread winner of the family, really need to change him), my new warlock is Herb/Alchemy, my shaman is probably the profession mix my DK SHOULD have with Enchant/JC

 

[Kayeich]

As I mentioned previous page, I was having problems with mana while levelling priest as an instance healer and pondered disc. Nobody really commented on yay/nay, but I went ahead and respecced my low level (hit level 35 today) priest today. Then ran a chain of instance pugs to see how it did.

Yikes. It did entirely too well as I seem to be meeting a lot of pally tanks that tank with seal of light and judgement of light, and pull in groups of 1-4 instead of 6-8. Almost never ran low on mana at all. Gah, from one extreme of no mana to the next of bored out of my ass!

However, the rare few times today that I've had tanks that chain pull (my original concern with holy spec), my mana efficiency has been wonderful.

Compared to holy spec, I've had to drink much less often, and what I would have considered an overpull as holy, was survivable as disc as my mana lasted long enough for group to survive.

So I'm pretty happy with discipline for healing. Still find those 'seal of light' pally tanks kinda ridiculous though. I sometimes just run in and start holy nova spam, or whacking stuff with staff or using wand to level those weapon skills. So that's something, I guess? :sweat:

Also pretty happy for my pally. I got my two spell plate drops from H-PoS on same run (after running it like a million times, only a trillion times left for the spell chest from Falric in H-HoR now).

 

[akun50]

As I mentioned previous page, I was having problems with mana while levelling priest as an instance healer and pondered disc. Nobody really commented on yay/nay, but I went ahead and respecced my low level (hit level 35 today) priest today. Then ran a chain of instance pugs to see how it did.

Yikes. It did entirely too well as I seem to be meeting a lot of pally tanks that tank with seal of light and judgement of light, and pull in groups of 1-4 instead of 6-8. Almost never ran low on mana at all. Gah, from one extreme of no mana to the next of bored out of my ass!

However, the rare few times today that I've had tanks that chain pull (my original concern with holy spec), my mana efficiency has been wonderful.

Compared to holy spec, I've had to drink much less often, and what I would have considered an overpull as holy, was survivable as disc as my mana lasted long enough for group to survive.

So I'm pretty happy with discipline for healing. Still find those 'seal of light' pally tanks kinda ridiculous though. I sometimes just run in and start holy nova spam, or whacking stuff with staff or using wand to level those weapon skills. So that's something, I guess? :sweat:

Also pretty happy for my pally. I got my two spell plate drops from H-PoS on same run (after running it like a million times, only a trillion times left for the spell chest from Falric in H-HoR now).

I commented yay... :blue:

And congrats. Despite being a tad boring, it's nice to have mana for once, huh?

As for the Seal of Light pallies, they must've run into too many priests who've run out of mana at inopportune moments, because IIRC, that particular spec is better for multiple opponents.

 

[Kayeich]

Lol, you did, but your comments were more for endgame level 80 healing, which isn't quite the same. =p

 

[Belgarion213]

Yay, got my lock Im levling to 35 today. While im learning the ropes (and being highly inefficient as I learn that I don't have 20k mana on this guy) its been quite entertaining.

Mainly levaling by chaining random dungeons/battleground with questing between. If I dont say so myself Ive leveled pretty fast since i just started thi charecter last week.

 

[endev8003]

Had two bad experiences in Random HC's recently.

I've been queuing as DPS lately, rather than healer. Got into PoS (first time as DPS) and everything went well. However, halfway through the first boss (Garfrost), the healer quits. As far as I can tell, is wasn't a d/c. After the wipe the tank quit as well. There was no messages or anything in the group (not even a 'Hi').

Second one was Occulus. We get in and everybody waits for a minute or so to weed out the quitters. After that we start going. Everything went well up to the last boss, where we wipe because some of the DPS don't know the tactics. We switch the healer drakes since our healer admitted that he didn't know how to use the drake. And then we wipe again because of the same DPS that still doesn't know how the fight goes.

Also, why is people queuing for random dungeons when they are not going to accept? Last night I was re-queued 5 times because somebody declined or didn't accept in time. Four of those were the DPS that declined, which is confusing to me since they have to wait 15 minutes to get a random again due to queuing times.

 

[Darksnider05]

Mmm I know how you feel queing Dps may take longer but healing or tanking can be stressful after a while.

 

[Belgarion213]

Had two bad experiences in Random HC's recently.

I've been queuing as DPS lately, rather than healer. Got into PoS (first time as DPS) and everything went well. However, halfway through the first boss (Garfrost), the healer quits. As far as I can tell, is wasn't a d/c. After the wipe the tank quit as well. There was no messages or anything in the group (not even a 'Hi').

Second one was Occulus. We get in and everybody waits for a minute or so to weed out the quitters. After that we start going. Everything went well up to the last boss, where we wipe because some of the DPS don't know the tactics. We switch the healer drakes since our healer admitted that he didn't know how to use the drake. And then we wipe again because of the same DPS that still doesn't know how the fight goes.

Also, why is people queuing for random dungeons when they are not going to accept? Last night I was re-queued 5 times because somebody declined or didn't accept in time. Four of those were the DPS that declined, which is confusing to me since they have to wait 15 minutes to get a random again due to queuing times.

I've been guilty of this a coule times, its precisely BECAUSE it takes 15 minutes that it happens to me. usually I'm pretty good and Ill join the queue while doing a mining run around Ice crown or such, or even just doing dailies at Sons of Hodir or argent tournament but other times ill be looking at articles on my second monitor and because the sound doesn't carry over when your on the second monitor sometimes Ill just miss the thing entirely. However I can completely agree about people who leave it to long, when it happens to me it drives me nuts.

 

[endev8003]

I've been guilty of this a coule times, its precisely BECAUSE it takes 15 minutes that it happens to me. usually I'm pretty good and Ill join the queue while doing a mining run around Ice crown or such, or even just doing dailies at Sons of Hodir or argent tournament but other times ill be looking at articles on my second monitor and because the sound doesn't carry over when your on the second monitor sometimes Ill just miss the thing entirely. However I can completely agree about people who leave it to long, when it happens to me it drives me nuts.

There is an option in WoW that will play sound even if you're alt-tabbed out of the game. I have mine switched on, because I'm sometimes checking stuff on wowhead, etc. and I want to hear whispers and other alerts.

I'm not sure how that will work on two monitors though. I'm not sure how WoW displays on two monitors. Doesn't the one monitor display the game while the other displays something else?

 

[Kayeich]

Hell, I've missed queues for random dungeons as a healer. Sometimes it just takes so long, you've gone and gotten a drink/snack or gone to the bathroom, and timing has fucked you over.

And some people just don't like playing with WoW's sounds on (although I do, I find it useful for things like this and fishing and hearing voices of some bosses), so they might not even know about the sound thing, so if they alt-tab, and don't check in time, they're also screwed.

Really, it's a patience game. DPS has it worse than tanks and healers though, so more chance to get screwed there.

 

[Belgarion213]

I've been guilty of this a coule times, its precisely BECAUSE it takes 15 minutes that it happens to me. usually I'm pretty good and Ill join the queue while doing a mining run around Ice crown or such, or even just doing dailies at Sons of Hodir or argent tournament but other times ill be looking at articles on my second monitor and because the sound doesn't carry over when your on the second monitor sometimes Ill just miss the thing entirely. However I can completely agree about people who leave it to long, when it happens to me it drives me nuts.

There is an option in WoW that will play sound even if you're alt-tabbed out of the game. I have mine switched on, because I'm sometimes checking stuff on wowhead, etc. and I want to hear whispers and other alerts.

I'm not sure how that will work on two monitors though. I'm not sure how WoW displays on two monitors. Doesn't the one monitor display the game while the other displays something else?

Um basically it works the same, and I didn't know about that option will have to check it. Basically I run WoW maximised but in windowed mode, while firefox or IRC takes up the second monitor, its basically the same as if I tabbed out.

 

[akun50]

I don't mind the sounds in WoW, except in combat. The sounds in combat just get hellacious and distracting, so I tend to turn it off. I also tend to use Skype when running with friends, so hearing clanging metal, explosions, Howling Blasts, etc. makes trying to listen to what my friends are saying rather difficult.

As for queueing, I try to get anything that might pull me away done beforehand, mostly because I dislike having to stop when someone has to use the restroom, walk the dog or get a drink five minutes into the shorter instances.

I know the call of nature can be random (especially with diarrhea), but the dog and the drink really should be handled BEFORE queueing. It's why I tend to have three bottles of water near me so I don't need to step away; and if it's my turn to do so, I walk the dog before I even log onto WoW.

 

[endev8003]

Had an interesting, and rather fun experience in UP today for my daily HC. During the Skadi battle the tank started lagging just before Skadi dismounted. The fight became something of a threat tennis match between me and the hunter. I would get aggro and as he reached me, shadowmelded. This caused him to go after the hunter. After there was some distance, I started attacking again. I think the hunter used FD or SM, because he was soon after me again. When he reached me, I switched to travel form, popped barkskin and started running. Soon after that the hunter managed to get aggro again, and then Skadi died soon after that.

Amazingly, no one died during that fight, but it was a rather confusing battle for me. I'm glad the healer had a good head during that fight, because for a while I had no idea what was going on, other that playing ping-pong with the aggro. It was after the second escape that I saw the tank just standing there that I guessed he was lagging.

Annoyingly, he got back right after Skadi died. We all had some laughs about it afterwards.

 

[akun50]

I've recently picked up my Priestess again to level her to 80. It's been a rather trying road, since most of the Northrend stuff is more friendly towards people in groups, and getting XP is insanely trying even for those with better armor.

Last night, though, a fellow guildie, an 80 BE Paladin, was nice enough to run my priestess through a large number of LFG dungeons to get XP. Most of the runs we did, I was healer and did what I feel was a pretty damn good job, except for the few times I lagged and someone died (4 deaths in 7 or so runs, so I feel I did an excellent job).

Usually, the problem areas were the Proto-drake pen in Utgarde Keep when the DPS got a little overly amibitious because of the 80 paladin and the fact that I'd keeping everyone topped off (oddly enough, only had to stop to drink 6 times throughout all the runs, and almost always after the DPS pulled too much); and Ingvarr, when he used Dark Smash, then immediately followed it with throwing his axe.

Which is weird because I figured the Nexus runs should've been more problematic.

 

[Kayeich]

I'm kinda surprised you're finding Northrend hard to level in. I always thought it was incredibly easy and straightforward, and now you can heirloom cold weather flying from a level 80, so it's even easier for those pre-77 levels. Easy quests and lots of gold, what's to hate?

I also didn't find there to be -that- many group quests, and specced as a healer it's generally fairly easy to find others to group up with as well. My dps DK had a harder time levelling through some group quests than my holy paladin.

True, DK could solo a fair chunk of them, but it took much longer (such as kiting Gigantaur because he blew me up in 2-3 hits. God that took FOREVER), and didn't have as easy a time finding others to group with, while pally just had to say something in general about looking for some help with a group quest and easily found some schmuck to take the hits and deal them back while I kept them alive.

Plus, really, how can you not quest in northrend? You miss awesome stuff like the wrathgate event.

 

[endev8003]

I also found Northrend to be easy to level. I prefer soloing, and I rarely do dungeons. The only dungeons I actually did while leveling to 80 was Blackfathom Deeps, Gnomeregan, Deadmines and Hellfire Ramparts.

Going from 1-60 is very slow, but hopefully, that will get better in Cataclysm. 60-70 went fast, and I hit 70 in my fourth zone, while not doing any dungeon or group quests. (Hellfire -> Zangarmarsh -> Nagrand -> Terrokar).

From 70-80 was very fast for me. There is a lot of quests in each zone, and you should even be able to get the quest achievement for most of the zones without doing any group or dungeon quests. The biggest exception to this is Icecrown, which has an unually large amount of group quests.

As a priest, it is going to be more difficult to solo group quests if you're not outgeared for the quest. I had a feral druid and had to switch to bear regularly to deal with elite mobs.

 

[Belgarion213]

Personally for me Northeend was insanely fast leveling, even on my first toon to reach it (My DK), I went through it surprisingly fast. While leveling my shaman through it was just as fast. And really as you level don't TOUCH icecrown till your 80, leave it. Only hit Storm Peaks at 78-79.. The reason I say this has nothing to do with difficulty and everything to do with getting lots of gold from the quests in there, easily made a couple thousand finishing of storm peaks and hitting Ice crown.

NR was much faster than 58-68 I did in outland.

 

[akun50]

I think part of it has to do with four issues.

1) I'm leveling my enchanting. This is going to slow me down, regardless of where I am in leveling. I'd've put it off until I was 80, but I was focusing largely on my DK before, so leveling was slow either way, so I figured "might as well". :huh.: And enchanting's been slow since I wanted to get tailoring up to the point I can make Frostweave Bags (because bag space is, has, and always will be a fucking premium with me)

2) I'm having to swap between Discipline and Shadow spec and getting gear that's good for both is a fucking nightmare right now.

3) I'm not sure if it's because of my spell rotation or what, but after about four or so enemies, I usually need to stop and restore mana. My mana just got past 10K last night. Ironically, when I'm healing in an instance, my mana issues are far fewer unless someone's being a dumbshit and aggroing far more than they can handle.

4) Elite mobs are a goddamn nightmare for a squishy caster, especially when there's two or more near each other or they're linked mobs, and I don't have someone to take the hits. For some reason, unless I'm 6 levels or higher above them, they simply deal too much damage for my Power Word Shield, and pound the shit out of me in short order. Even when there's only one, I typically need at least 2 levels on them to have a good chance at winning.

 

[Bjorn]

My main has 6062 gearscore, and therefore I can claim to be completely unbiased when I say that gearscore sucks big hairy monkey balls. Worst addon ever made.