So, I have changed my mind about LFR, I won’t really be doing them again any time soon, perhaps if I can find 25 people who want to do it…but otherwise they can go and shove it.
I will be the first to admit, the first 2 runs I did were awesome, both leaders explained the fights, gave everyone a chance to ask questions and generally were awesome raid leaders. Last week I ran LFR another 4 times, so in total 6 – and I can say – the first two were the only ones I enjoyed. The rest, had abusive people, calling people names, not explaining fights, telling people off when they died (from not knowing fights), dropping group because people didn’t know what was going on or asking questions – or maybe too rude….I don’t know.
I decided to try and run LFR today for the new bosses and I have just been into 3 different raids – and have wiped once on the first boss and have copped so much abuse that I left. Ok, here I admit, the first one I actually joined as lead accidentally – I didn’t realise the lead stays when you change raids….my bad…I asked in the raid more than 6 times for someone to lead and take over as I had never been there – but noone did – however once we died and everyone started having a go at me, I said it one final time, no one answered so I dropped. Ok I admit I didn’t realise I had chosen lead – but there were p[lenty of people in there who could have taken over and just didn’t want to as I figure it was easier to abuse people.
Anyway so I left that one and joined another one, same thing…bunch of people being arseholes to each other and calling people names, telling them to DIAF etc…so we wiped on the boss and then after some more abuse I left that one as well.
I joined one more and i made sure i said in raid chat that I had never been here before – however the raid leader didn’t explain the fight then yelled at us on the boss to stack, which we did, and then we all tarted dying…I clicked the button and lasted a little longer…anyway…then someone said “don’t Q if you don’t know the fights”……so what the fuck is the point of the LFR tool then??
Sorry Blizzard I am normally on board with your new things – and I really was with this one….until now….Until you get rid of the fucking idiots, wanders, arseholes and general fuckers in this game – the same thing is going to occur. And potentially people are not going to want to take up raiding if that is how they get spoken to. I don’t need to pay money each month to get abused….and I am sorry it is not my idea of fun.
I am so angry right now. People like that make me hate this game and hate people even more. So I no longer be running the LFR again.
I’ve only had decent experiences with LFr so far, always a couple of people who don’t have a clue but rarely more than one horrible wipe. I dread the day I end up in an awful group, I know it will come sooner or later… it always does.
Yeah i normally have really good luck with PUG and randoms – but yesterday my luck ran out! I might try again on the weekend when there are more people looking to do them, but I think even then I will be too chicken! 😀
OK Here’s the simple explanation to this problem.
Raids were never ever ever met to be pugged. Never.
In order to allow almost every man and his dog the opportunity to see PvE content, Blizzard has, over the years dumped down raiding content and instituted these tools as a pure commercial decision, thereby devaluing the time and effort of those that wish to take raiding seriously, and leaving the common WoW player with the expectation that they ‘should’ be able to successfully PUG a raid in the first few weeks of content being released.
Think about what we were asked to do in order to raid in Vanilla or BC. There were lengthy and time consuming attunement processes. Players were expected to complete 5man dungeons and quests without the kind of sophisticated LFG tool that we have now before they even thought about setting foot in a raid. This process in itself sorted the wheat from the chaff. It meant that players learnt and refined skills along the attunement path. Communication and excellent game play were crucial, as was cooperation with your guild and the members helping you with your attunement. And being a complex process it required research. It meant that only the very best PvEr ended up raiding – players that researched, communicated and cooperated, players that had taken the time to build the strong ties with the guild that they would be raiding with. If they didn’t have the skills required to raid (either socially or in terms of game play) they could not raid.
And now? The bare minimum raid requirements mean that people are able to access raiding content based on nothing other than item level. Let’s face it item level is incredibly easy to increase now in a short amount of time with the influx of high item level crafted items in later expansion packs. People do not need even research what type of gear they should wear or what stats are most beneficial to their class, anything with a higher item level is just automatically assumed “better”.
As a result we have players hitting level cap, and just assuming that they can pug a raid, without appreciating all of the skills that are necessary to successfully raid. They are not forced to learn to cooperate, they are not made to research, they do not even need a guild. And then they wonder why they aren’t successful, and it’s so very simple – raids were never designed to be pugged.
I do not understand why it is such a surprise that these people are frustrated, angry and take it out on their fellow puggers. Consider how hard it is to get 25 people to do something, anything, in real life with no formal leadership or consequences of poor behaviour. Then put those same 25 people behind a PC screen so that anonymity allows them to exhibit their frustrations in a way that would not be socially acceptable if they were face to face with the same people. Of course it’s not going to work.
And before someone chimes in with the argument that you shouldn’t need to be guilded to raid, let me point out that while I’m all for freedom of choice, at least a guild offers people a consequence for treating their fellow members poorly – in a guild run you swear at someone and abuse them, hopefully the leadership boots them, so as horrid a person as they may be, if they want to stay in the raid or the guild they know they need to behave. There is no such consequence for pugs with no leadership.
Don’t worry though, in a few weeks time there will be enough people still pugging that know the fights to carry through all the people that just rock up without researching. And no doubt Blizzard will nerf content cause it’s all just “too hard”. Thereby further devaluing the time and effort spent by people that actually take pride in their raiding, and leaving little incentive for decent players to even continue playing at all.
You are right Ho Hum. I have always felt that way as well, however I guess that’s the problem with the money making side of things – they had hoped it would increase the raiding numbers and in the end after all these years it still hasn’t. They still only have 5% of the population actually raiding.
40 man raids were a definite test of your abilities as a human to co=ordinate with people, play well with others, miss out on raids etc – I wish they had just made the content suit 40 people so you still had to have the skill level. I know a lot of people complained that you could just sit there and do nothing and had I known today what I know about my class and the game I would have been a much better player as well.
I am just more annoyed with the constant lack of respect for other people simply because you are behind a computer screen, I am not the abusive name calling type anyway – only when having an emo rant and making sweeping generalisations – and I just don’t appreciate having people do it to me for no other reason than they don’t want to spend 4 minutes typing out and explanation of a fight.
Such is life, the old times are gone 🙁
had a simalar experiance in LFR too – good week one as only players with the gear (and presumably skill) from doing FL had 372ilvl to get in. Now every tom dick and harry has it, its a total disaster. I honestly hope it settles down soon, but right now, its a total and utter clusterf**k. Personally, I’ll be only doing the new 5 mans which are jolly good to get points capped.
Glad I am not alone on the disaster front. I will give it another shot this weekend at some point and see how I fare. I want to see the next lot of bosses!!