When do you give up on a PUG dungeon run?

Asardes · February 2018

kringled_1 wrote: »

@Asardes While the advice to try to find a guild that matches your interests best isn't bad advice, it's often very easy to give and hard to carry out in practice; activity/interest level, expected skill level, and general personality mesh can all matter; to analogize to trade guilds, given that I don't bring in much stuff to sell, it makes more sense for me to be in a trade guild with a more remote trader, even though it means I sell stuff at a discount relative to say Mournhold.

And yes, the DS2 run I posted about was normal; this is a character who I recently got to vet ranks and have been leveling Undaunted with. Now that she's at 9, I will be slowing up on that. I don't claim to be super great at this; I'm running normals and easier veterans because I know that with this character I can pull my own weight in that content. I may be able to carry a little bit as healer with some extra dps, although since most of what I have is ground based AOEs (Liquid Lightning, Storm Blockade), if mobs are in my face and the tank is not even remotely trying to control/taunt etc them, those become a lot less efficient. I still haven't figured out how to deal as healer with the combined challenge of very low damage, damage dealers who are super squishy and die.

If it was normal you should have had no problems nuking the boss yourself, especially on a magicka Sorcerer. I remember one random normal I got on mine as a "fake tank" and the group was stuck at the Engine Guardian. I came in an melted that in about one minute with 80% of group DPS. It was at about the same level of difficulty as vMA arena 4 boss round that has pretty similar mechanics. If you drop your DoTs and Elemental Rage on that boss when it stops you kill him pretty fast. And Undaunted Mettle makes very little difference. 6% more magicka means ~3% less damage, or less than 1K on a 30K parse. So you should have carried the group.

Bucky Balls · February 2018

When the arrogant, know-all child who has selfishly and presumptiously held everyone up while they whined incessantly, despite reassurances, to do quest, kill every boss, find books, loot everything and search everywhere then throws a complete toys-hurled-from-the pram tantrum at last boss because they failed, again, to listen and apply the polite advice freely given ran away, resetting boss, and died.

While I'll almost always courteously wait for quest, do extra mobs/bosses etc, my patience has limits and I just cannot put up with continually selfish, childish and arrogant behaviour.

There's been a few threads lately about waiting for quest completion in dungeons and I usually do. But this cuts both ways: act like a spoiled brat and I'm out. Show a tiny bit of respect and courtesy and I'll wait in group for as long as you want so you can explore everywhere.

visionality · February 2018

Golden rule: I always leave a vet dungeon when the tank turns out to be a fake (no taunt at all and usually zero DPS on top) and the other two group members disagree in the vote to kick. Ofc I first ask the tank why he has no taunt slotted and whether he is willing to do so or otherwise to leave the group on his own.

If people want to run around with jerks its their decision, but I just can't be bothered anymore. Did it one time too often and the only result from carrying a fake-tank through a dungeon is that he will queue as fake-tank again.

EDIT: I never queue for normal dungeons and I dont kick people who are willing to listen and to learn and simply dont understand the mechanic or their role in it. Its just the *** who abuse queueing mechanisms to get an easy ride to a helmet they do not deserve that I do not tolerate anymore.

Zagnut123Zagnut123 · February 2018

kringled_1 wrote: »

Recapitulating my pledges yesterday, to see where other people would have bailed on the second group.
I'm runing my magicka sorcerer healer, and yes I am healing.

Tempest Island (normal), no problems, group damage is a bit low but the tank is solid and it's a smooth run, no deaths, and I got to see an alternate path up towards the peak.

Darkshade II, and from the first trash pack, I can see it's going to be a long slog of a run. Group dps is really low, the 'tank' is a dual wield/bow dps with no taunt and no crowd control, so mobs are just everywhere, the 'dps' are super squishy, and my ~8k dps (blockade, liquid lightning, and light attacks) is consistently 40-45% of group numbers. At most pulls, the dps and the tank are all trying to bravely take up positions behind me for lord only knows what reason. We actually wipe at The Fallen Foreman (I just let myself die when both dps died quickly and I wasn't able to get one up without the tank dying, and then the rezzed dps died again). Reset and we get through that, I'm consistently the only one rezzing both of the dps, Transmuted Alit takes forever because I don't think they understood the mechanics and kept focussing the low health member of the trio - had to pop a destro ult after about the 5th time one or two got back up. The Grobull fight is always a bit chaotic, but all of the other fights up till Engine Guardian I know from past experience can go a lot smoother; this time almost all of my healing was from twilight because most of the time I had a mob in my face and the dps were not in position where I could reliably hit more than one with springs/prayer .
At Engine Guardian, the dps are all over the place, we wipe, someone pulls again before i can explain any mechanism, and we wipe again. At this point finally we get to discuss the mechanics, I yell at them for consistent crappy dps, they yell at me for not healing ( I don't think anyone can heal the whole team through poison air if they are scattered all over the place) I tell them the cue for poison air (green color and the hiss) and one dps says "I can't see that color. I don't hear the hiss" and the other dps says he's playing with the audio off. I just tell them to stack on me, initiate a ready check, and they all ready...and then the one guy goes immobile for 3 minutes, eventually he says he's fixing his skill bars. We finally get through the third time, overall it took over an hour which is truly ridiculous. I probably should have bailed long before - I know that this can go much more smoothly.

I do mostly PUG dungeons as tank or healer, and yes, some of them are a struggle, but it usually goes well enough, and every so often you realize that there are actually a fair number of the same mechanics on normal that are on vet, they just aren't apparent until you have tragically low dps. I've only once actually bailed when it wasn't a team decision, but maybe I should more often. What's your threshhold for leaving?

Bless your kind heart. I would have left after noticing the dps percentage on a boss. I'm not opposed to explain things to ppl to help them but I can sacrifice 1 hr to a dungeon that's soloable on a dps toon.

kringled_1 · February 2018

DoctorESO wrote: »

Calling something nonsense does not make it nonsense. Emphasis on "the elitism is unwarranted."

I called it nonsense because I'm still having problems figuring out where the elitism is. Can you spell it out, because maybe we're using completely different definitions of elitism. I don't consider myself anywhere above mediocre at this game overall. It doesn't bug me that I'm in a dungeon with players below CP16o, although it does mean that if someone didn't bring food, I don't have any on me that can help. It doesn't bug me that players have non-spectacular dps, but when group total dps is in the <20k range, some content is going to be very slow or difficult. It does bug me more when someone signs up as a tank and doesn't have a taunt slotted, when someone goes inert for several minutes without communicating, when people at >CP100 are running without a food buff (not 'my food ran out mid fight', which happens to everyone, just plain not having a food buff), when people are apparently trying to play without audio which severely impacts their ability to get cues for mechanics - all of that shows a lack of consideration for the others in the group. I cut a lot of slack for all of the <lvl 30 tanks with 2H only that I have hit running dungeons like nFG1, nWR1; those guys are new to the game and sometimes are open to being told that they're doing something wrong.

Asardes wrote: »

If it was normal you should have had no problems nuking the boss yourself, especially on a magicka Sorcerer. I remember one random normal I got on mine as a "fake tank" and the group was stuck at the Engine Guardian. I came in an melted that in about one minute with 80% of group DPS. It was at about the same level of difficulty as vMA arena 4 boss round that has pretty similar mechanics. If you drop your DoTs and Elemental Rage on that boss when it stops you kill him pretty fast. And Undaunted Mettle makes very little difference. 6% more magicka means ~3% less damage, or less than 1K on a 30K parse. So you should have carried the group.

I'm sure a good experienced magSorc can nuke Engine Guardian by themselves. That's not me. This is my first magSorc, and I have very little practice doing damage outside of trivial overland content; I'm running what I'm sure are suboptimal sets in this situation and most of the skills on my bars are heal skills when I signed up as a healer. Gear is all purple because I don't really want to spend gold tempers on golding out weapons I'm not sure I want to keep using in the long run. In the Engine Guardian fight, on our last attempt, I spent a lot of my time just keeping the team healed as long as they were near me, call me silly, but I guess when I sign up as healer I think of that as my primary job until someone puts themselves in a position where I can't do it.

And I guess I wasn't clear about Undaunted - getting Mettle was the reason for me to be pugging random normals in the first place, not the reason why I couldn't clear the boss by myself.

DoctorESO · February 2018

visionality wrote: »

Golden rule: I always leave a vet dungeon when the tank turns out to be a fake (no taunt at all and usually zero DPS on top) and the other two group members disagree in the vote to kick. Ofc I first ask the tank why he has no taunt slotted and whether he is willing to do so or otherwise to leave the group on his own.

What's their usual response?

"lol u need tank?"

"lol u need heals?"

"lol u need dps?"

Mureel · February 2018

As long as learning is happening, I'll keep healing. If I tell ya at the start and several more times 'focus stranglers' or 'focus plants' and why (VBF) and we keep wiping to poison - for example - I'm done.

Asardes · February 2018

kringled_1 wrote: »

DoctorESO wrote: »

Calling something nonsense does not make it nonsense. Emphasis on "the elitism is unwarranted."

I called it nonsense because I'm still having problems figuring out where the elitism is. Can you spell it out, because maybe we're using completely different definitions of elitism. I don't consider myself anywhere above mediocre at this game overall. It doesn't bug me that I'm in a dungeon with players below CP16o, although it does mean that if someone didn't bring food, I don't have any on me that can help. It doesn't bug me that players have non-spectacular dps, but when group total dps is in the <20k range, some content is going to be very slow or difficult. It does bug me more when someone signs up as a tank and doesn't have a taunt slotted, when someone goes inert for several minutes without communicating, when people at >CP100 are running without a food buff (not 'my food ran out mid fight', which happens to everyone, just plain not having a food buff), when people are apparently trying to play without audio which severely impacts their ability to get cues for mechanics - all of that shows a lack of consideration for the others in the group. I cut a lot of slack for all of the <lvl 30 tanks with 2H only that I have hit running dungeons like nFG1, nWR1; those guys are new to the game and sometimes are open to being told that they're doing something wrong.

Asardes wrote: »

If it was normal you should have had no problems nuking the boss yourself, especially on a magicka Sorcerer. I remember one random normal I got on mine as a "fake tank" and the group was stuck at the Engine Guardian. I came in an melted that in about one minute with 80% of group DPS. It was at about the same level of difficulty as vMA arena 4 boss round that has pretty similar mechanics. If you drop your DoTs and Elemental Rage on that boss when it stops you kill him pretty fast. And Undaunted Mettle makes very little difference. 6% more magicka means ~3% less damage, or less than 1K on a 30K parse. So you should have carried the group.

I'm sure a good experienced magSorc can nuke Engine Guardian by themselves. That's not me. This is my first magSorc, and I have very little practice doing damage outside of trivial overland content; I'm running what I'm sure are suboptimal sets in this situation and most of the skills on my bars are heal skills when I signed up as a healer. Gear is all purple because I don't really want to spend gold tempers on golding out weapons I'm not sure I want to keep using in the long run. In the Engine Guardian fight, on our last attempt, I spent a lot of my time just keeping the team healed as long as they were near me, call me silly, but I guess when I sign up as healer I think of that as my primary job until someone puts themselves in a position where I can't do it.

And I guess I wasn't clear about Undaunted - getting Mettle was the reason for me to be pugging random normals in the first place, not the reason why I couldn't clear the boss by myself.

Normal dungeons are not very efficient for leveling Undaunted, since it's very slow. Normal mode completion adds only 10 reputation points AFAIK. All other achievements are done in Veteran only: no death, speed run, difficult mode which are 50 points apiece. Turning in veteran HM pledges is 30. By comparison the Undaunted dailies (not the pledges, but the quests from the orc sitting there that send you to kill a delve boss) give you 10 points every time, and you can do multiple if you get them from other players. And this saves you the hassle of cooperation with other players. In the mean time practice your rotation on dummy, try to solo world bosses, and give at least normal Maelstrom a shot since it will help you learn the basics.

As for Sorcerer rotation, if you keep your Power Surge up, refresh Haunting Curse, Liquid Lightning and Blockade on backbar then do 3 pulses and 2 heavy attacks on front bar you are already doing ~80% of your potential damage without any back bar weaving, you are sitting at full resources, and you are fully healed. You can cast Pulse while your heavy attack is going and they'll hit at the same time. That's how simple it is. Gear doesn't matter that much. If you get 5 crafted 5 Law of Julianos and 3 Torug's Pact and pair that with Arcane Willpower jewels you're good to go. If the group has bad DPS and dies all the time despite being healed, then simply stop supporting them and go on your own because they are not worth it since it's your time at stake.

qwyksylver · April 2018

When i am 60%+ group dps, 40%+ group heals and am tanking adds.....i leave. Less than that and i'll prob put up with it until we clear unless people prove they both have no clue of the mechanics and are unwilling to learn

Sawzallz · April 2018

Probably off topic but nobody wants to be a tank if he's the first to go it's never the dps fault always the tanks.
Also there's people who are like "oh a tempar tank cute, kick."

Also i got kicked cause they thought my stam sorc is a hybrid. When i was the only one doing dps