Not all PUGS are the same

PrimusTiberius

PS4 player here, last night after getting home from work and downloading the new content, logged in and check in with my guildies, they were all busy either in the new dungeons or playing in other activities, so I queued up the dungeon finder for Shipwright's Regret, once in, the group got into group chat, couple jokes and we're off and running. Nice to have everyone on the same page, we were all exploring the new dungeons, looking for chest, finding the hidden bosses and picking up achievements, once completed, we all decided to hit The Coral Aerie and did the same there. After we completed that dungeon, we decided to stay grouped up and ran both dungeons again for drops. Conversations was easy going, joking around about this or that, no tryhards jacking up the run, just 4 guys running the dungeons. After the last run, we traded some gear, said our goodbys and wished everyone a good evening.

Not all PUGS are a bad experience. Cheers!

Kisakee

I usually run dungeons with my girl which means that we're going to get other couples that joined together (Yes, this is how the dungeon finder actually works) and most of the times nothing special happens. Sometimes we're getting some very nice people we're having fun with, on other occasions people can be actual muppets when it comes to group play. It's always nice to get the enjoyable exceptions.

Ragnarok0130

It's really a Die roll with PUGs, sometimes you get 4 people who know how to run dungeons and you have an awesome experience and the other times you roll all 1s for your group comp and it doesn't go well. I really enoy the times I get the nice groups.

jecks33

the thing I miss most from my eso experience on ps4 (i'm on pc now) is the group voice chat. Was super easy to make new friends.

WhiteCoatSyndrome

I had a nice PuG over the weekend that helped me get a no-death Vaults of Madness run during Pledges.

If you guys are reading this, thank you!

everseeing_njpreub18_ESO

I don't group often, normal or vet 4-mans, some hard modes, but when i do most of the PUG's I've run with have been ok to good, usually my only complaint is rushing but its understandable for older content.

Most common issue would be a quitter when the group doesn't breeze over a boss and (just in my experience, usually the tank) someone gets annoyed and quits.

Overall for my occasional PUG, good experiences.

PrimusTiberius

everseeing_njpreub18_ESO wrote: »

I don't group often, normal or vet 4-mans, some hard modes, but when i do most of the PUG's I've run with have been ok to good, usually my only complaint is rushing but its understandable for older content.

Most common issue would be a quitter when the group doesn't breeze over a boss and (just in my experience, usually the tank) someone gets annoyed and quits.

Overall for my occasional PUG, good experiences.

very rarely will I PUG a Vet but have no issue with normal, most who run normals nowadays are in it for drops and/or crystals, which is fine for me, but its nice when a cool group gets on. Cheers

Bat

everseeing_njpreub18_ESO wrote: »

Most common issue would be a quitter when the group doesn't breeze over a boss and (just in my experience, usually the tank) someone gets annoyed and quits.

Tank: *dies to entirely standard tank mechanic*
Tank: You don't have the dps to finish this!
Tank: *rage quits*

Supreme_Atromancer

A few observations I have:

You are right, not all PUGS are horrible experiences. Some are fantastic, many are fine, some are "Eh. We got there."

In my experience you'll get some who are going out of their way *to an embarrassing degree* to all but yell "I'M BETTER THAN YOU, I DON'T HAVE TIME FOR THIS. STAY OUT OF MY WAY YOU DISGUSTING PLEBS" when its absolutely uncalled for.

But tbh, most of the so-called dramas are actually played out on Reddit, or the comment section of stuff like Nefas' Toxic Casuals video. Its just cringey videogame drama and rageporn tbh. It used to be the Official Forums was the worst for it, and had a reputation as a toxic cesspool, but the mods have actually done a decent job of cleaning it up and now people can have constructive conversations, even when they disagree strongly about stuff.

One interesting anecdote is a time when I pugged vFH with a tank who was struggling. He later said that he was back after a long haitus, and it showed. But we were fine. The last boss was a bit of a struggle because the healer ragequit and the other DPS was also kinda new, but we got there and the tank was like "Wow, what they say is true. ESO has the best community!". I didn't tell him that the healer spammed vote to kick a dozen times before he noped.

WhiteCoatSyndrome

Supreme_Atromancer wrote: »

I didn't tell him that the healer spammed vote to kick a dozen times before he noped.

And stuff like this (protecting a random stranger from unnecessary toxicity) is WHY ESO has the best community.

RisenEclipse

I have not actually seen that many toxic pug groups. The average is people going in, clearing the dungeon and typing tyfg before leaving. Although most people need to understand that if you want secret bosses or are doing the story PLEASE say so in chat BEFORE we move in to clear it. If you say you want to do a secret boss at the end... you will most likely get a very negative response. Run is over. It's time to go. No one wants to do more work after they think the work is now done. But honestly, I have asked to do secret bosses before and have never gotten a negative response from it. There was one time where we got a real stick up their butt tank that wanted to kick a DPS on normal for not doing enough damage... It was NORMAL, and we were still clearing the dungeon. Normal is literally the training ground for the more harder content... Chill!

I for one do not type in chat at all during a run. It's hard for me to stop in the middle of what I am doing to type a response. There are also slow typers in the world that might feel uncomfortable about stopping the run to type a witty response in chat knowing it will take them awhile to do it. So just because chat is silent does not mean that the people doing the run are automatically unsocial or just don't like you :P Some people might also just might be too nervous to chat with complete strangers.

MidniteOwl1913

I pug 3 or 4 dungeons a day usually. For the most part, these are okay, not good, not bad. Things that I really appreciate, some times I'm slow going from room to room, my connection is laggy and I get distracted by loot sometimes (beets!, backpacks!, flour!) and having someone stop and make sure I'm not lost, it just is great! I appreciate being asked before doing secret bosses. I appreciate the understanding that not everyone is at the same skill level (and no it's not just me, new tanks and healers need to be allowed to do their thing).

Sometimes I get a really good group and at the end, I don't want to leave I just want to bask in the glow of feeling part of a successful team. I do wish sometimes that I was brave enough to ask to friend some of the people in these groups.

ShawnLaRock

I PUG almost exclusively, and it’s certainly more positive experiences than negative, IMHO - have most of my purple Coral & Ship jewelry farmed, for instance - so it’s been quite good lately.

It’s pretty easy to discern where the group vibe is - burn or quest or somewhere in between - and just go with that. The difference in time between forcing someone ahead and waiting, is like, 3 minutes. Even in frickin’ Vaults, where even skipping quest dialogue is a grind. Lol.

I level new toons a lot with Dungeon Finder, and I can’t recall a time when that character hadn’t done the quest - and someone else didn’t share it first - ‘cause they needed it, too. It almost always pairs people without the quest with others, in my experience.

S.

Edit: Speed Runners - at least stop for chests, pls. Even if you have already / don’t care about the gear - remember that even Simple Chests frequently give curated weapons… so shoot it over to me, please! Lol.