Pugging | Pugnacious Priest's Warcraft Blog

Posts Tagged 'Pugging'

Showing you the ropes.

Published January 4, 2010 World Of Warcraft 1 Comment
Tags: Pugging, random dungeon

“We would like to recognize your tenacity in running dungeons with people you probably haven’t met before. Hopefully even showed some rookies the ropes in your pick-up groups”

Reads the letter you get from the Wow Dev team when you achieve looking for Multitudes by grouping with 100 randoms and get your perky Pug.

I’m spending a lot of time in Dungeons, on my Priest Zahraah as Shadow but most often holy. ( please don’t leave me – I am still a shadow priest) on my Hunter Zippina, and now on occasion my 2nd priest Ostara. I’ve healed you – I’ve dps’d I’ve wiped with you, I’ve even lead you.

Yes we kicked the tank in Heroic Nexus with 18k health ” You’ve got to start somewhere” he tries to explain when we question why he the pally tank is wearing a spellpower chest. Or get concerned when a druid rolls a need on a green because it’s an upgrade, ( and it was.. ) or when I ask another druid in pure PVP gear including pvp trinkets does he have anything else to wear and he says no.

I’ve told a mage who gemmed for armor and attackpower on his belt he was fail – but the good news was we could help. ( and we did.. ) Seen people with gear missing from slots, I even left a group because someone refused to take off the santa hat and was going to fight a boss in it.

The wording in the letter – “Hopefully even showed some rookies the ropes in your pick-up groups” makes me reflect a little on how you tell people they are being scrub in these randoms, but most importantly. That it is their power to change. I don’t check anyone’s gear unless I think there is a problem, eg tank with low health, me as healer out dpsing the dps.

I don’t know every class by heart, so I don’t give suggestions to everyone, but when the mage doesn’t even have arcane intellect on themselves as a ghetto buff, or the warlock doesn’t have a pet anymore. Those things are kinda of obvious. It could also be part of my work background – my job was for many years working out what was missing from documents. Signatures, clauses, amendments, pages.

I am learning all about tanks.. ( and things like who should have shields) mainly so I can understand why some people are harder to heal then others. Partly because its a reflection of own ability if as a healer if I am struggling to keep a 40k tank up. When I find out he isn’t defence capped then I can go.. Ahhhhhh It’s not my fault.

I have been critiqued in my healing set – questioned why I had blackmagic on my weapon. ( it procs often enough that I like it for healing ) but yes heckles raised slightly – and my first reaction was to scoff. but then I had to laugh

I just recently discovered my 2nd priest didn’t have meditation – which is why I was struggling for mana) bad priest.

So in the spirit of showing you the ropes, I will offer advise if its obvious. It’s up to you what you do with it.

Pugnacious Pugging..

Published January 13, 2009 World Of Warcraft Closed
Tags: Instances, Pugging

Wowgrrl shows us that while pugs can be bad they can also be entertaining.

I will admit to getting some amusement at some of the pugs I have been in. I don’t have to enjoy them… but

Eg this week.
Tank ” I need to go Afk – my sister will be tanking for me.”
Hesisitant ok comes from rest of party. We wipe.
Tank “Oh Im so sorry – My sister ran away.. ”

Wipe on 1st boss in VH
Healer: “I don’t feel like grinding” – Doesn’t step in door. Instance gets restarted.
Me to tank : Uh.. you started it again without the healer..
Tank keeps killing.
Me: Guys its a wipe..
Tank keeps killing
Me /shadowmeld ( useless I know – but still.. )
We all die. ( but healer who has since left party)
Tank to me “Having a QQ are you?” kicks me from group.

At the very least my pugging has provided me with fodder for a new Add on I installed called Do I know you? ( DIKY) It allows for a Guild Sync and it beats me trying to keep a list on a notepad doc on my desktop.
I like it so far because It can be Sync’d cross guild ( not sure how this will work if you leave guild though) and you can manually add people.

I have started using it for positive comments on people I’ve met in pugs Eg ” Good healer.. ” and negative ones like ” Rude/abusive” I’m not sure exactly where/how things like Slander and Libel could come into this especially since it can be Guild Sync’d so more publically available – however real names aren’t attached so maybe it doesn’t apply.
As more then one person in the guild has it now, others are adding it. So I am cautious about what I say, and so far comments have been added on some from my ignore list from people who have either P’eed me off, or were rude. So I’ve said that. You don’t have to add comments, but you can give them a Nuetral, positive or negative mark, and people who also have contact with that person and the add installed can see a mark next to their name indicting their rating/comments, and they also can add their own rating and increase/decrease their score.

I don’t intend on stopping pugging. I win some and lose some, get to know some new names which may or not be in the raiding scene later and you can’t always get a guild only run. Curse of being DPS every man and his dog is dps 😛

Out Dpsing the Tank is not as easy as it should be..

Published January 7, 2009 World Of Warcraft 9 Comments
Tags: Heroics, Pugging

True to my word I’ve started to keep screenshots of my damage metres.

Two different Pug Heroic groups – Two different instances

I’m number 1 – ( Don’t look at my dps.. Its not that hot, )

What I would like to point out to you is the person who came in at number 2 Damage . Notice the pink colour that is the Paladin.. yes.. in both cases he was also the tank. I was competing against the tank for top DPS. There is something wrong there!

Sucessful Voilet Hold (

wowscrnshot_010609_193833

Failed Halls of lightening.*

wowscrnshot_010709_214935

*failed because the pug organiser didn’t tell us that Boss 1 was dead untill we had done clearing and he was no where to be seen.. ( If I hadn’t of been able to see boss 2 from the platform I would have left right then and there.. ) AND failed because we couldn’t get Loken down, We were trying the stand under his legs tactic, but the mage kept getting one shotted, and So I would shield him, and then not sheild me and the healer intime so one of us would get one shotted anyways, and they couldnt co-ordinate running away intime.. /sigh

Yes I have been posting more lately. I have more to say

I’ve also been approved for a 25 man tomorrow nite! Weeeee.

Where I get my coffee the coffee cart dude always pastes up the papers Starsign and comics so people can read while he is making ( very quickly) their order. My Star sign said that the people who make things look easy are the ones who put alot of hardwork into before hand, and that If I want to do the right thing I need to do alot of homework, So on the stinky hot train this afternoon – no Air con, my feet propping up the between carriage doors ( not the side doors – that would be dangerous) waiting for them to fix a derailed train – I was reading pages of 25 man strats.. at least so no matter what gets thrown at me – I hopefully won’t do something silly and die in a fire.

Don’t break my Sheep…

Published January 2, 2009 World Of Warcraft 7 Comments
Tags: Pugging

“Stop breaking my Sheep” Say the pug mage.

No one is Aoeing – not even the Warrior Tank.

“Stop breaking my Sheep!”

“Whats your Spell hit?” I ask as we wipe again.

“Thats got nothing to do with sheeping” Pug Mage says.

I armory him.. 130 spell hit level@ 80 in a Heroic

” Uh – mate thats why your sheep is breaking..”

“I’ve run this instance heaps of times… ”

I go to check his achievments..

Pug mage leaves the party.

I much prefer losing Dps’s in Pugs – easy to replace as long you can convince the tank and healer that its worth staying the run can still be rescued.

And yes, he goes we get a DK – and we finish the instance

In the name of progression and Theres something about Pugs..

Published May 12, 2008 Gaming , Guild , raid , Shadow Priest , World Of Warcraft 4 Comments
Tags: Gruls Lair, Kara, Pugging, raid, Warcraft

My Guild Officers have announced that our Kara Runs for the non leets. ( Za Runs for the officers and Core raiders) will now be 2 x ZA teams. Its official We are over Kara,

Wait… I’m not. I’ve missed out on 3 Weeks of a Decent Kara Run because I was being socialable for one of those nights and there were too many Dpsers and not enough healers and tanks to do more then one Kara run the other 2. So I’m moaning a little because one Kara Clear would have netted me the Badges I need for the next self obtainable Weapon Upgrade of that Badges Dagger. The Scryer’s Blade of Focus which has more +spell Damage and Stam then my Current Dagger the Nathrezim Mindblade.

So after being told at 830 Invites were over… I was like. Crap. One more run and It would have been mine. The Mats for Soulfrost are waiting for me in my Bank tab, just waiting to be lovelingly applied to the new blade. – Besides being a little miffed.. I had turned down a ZA offer outside guild an hour earlier in the hope I would get Kara. I’m not moaning too loudley because I did get to do progression runs this week – so its a catch 22 – I don’t need any loot from Kara.. so I really shouldnt get priority which is fair,

So In a bid to get badges I thought I’d try a pug. I do the whole Looking for group thing, and get two invites straight up – I’d only seen one guild around, and I figured I’d try that group.

“Ts or Vent I ask? -”
“Nope.”

“Opps..” Main Tank says ” I have to go.. ”
“Darn” Says another team memember, thats the 2nd Main Tank we’ve had leave.

I say.
” Guys Im sorry, but this seems rather disorganised, and I’d rather not lock myself out for a week on a run that is having so many issues so early.”
So I left, and I don’t feel bad. I would only do a Non Vent raid like Kara with people I already knew. Not with a pug. Its a preference, and I am a firm believer that 1 voice is better then 10 people trying to strategise if they are new to the raid in Chat.
In addition, they were pugging a Main tank – twice… and no immediate hope for replacement.
Did I want an easy badge run – Yes and no.. I didn’t care if it were a full clear and I don’t mind dying in the name of learning…. – I just didnt want to waste my time.

So No Kara for me this week.
On the flipside a person who I found while pugging Kara some months back – asked me on sunday night to come to a Gruls Raid – I thought about it – and thought why not – there was no scheduled raids and even thought I hesitated that this would be their 1st guild attempt at Gruls – I figured they seemed organised enough to have a decent shot – the difference in my faith was I knew 2 of the people in the raid, including the Raid leader, and they were filling in dps holes, not healers or tanks which can be volitile..

and we went – and 2 shotted High King.
and had 2 attempts on Grul. Rock fall and Shatter can be a pain to get used to, and not many in the raid had done the fight before.. 34% on the 2nd attempt, which was decent, they now have a better idea. They have the dps to get him next time.

So Highking gave me a badge … taking me to 135 – only 15 more to go.
I need to do more herorics.. just have difficultly findning a non guild group as everyone wants mages and warlocks for specific fights.. Priest CC doesn’t seem to count, so in a 5 man a Shadow Priest is not the 1st choice often, and also maybe I’m over Pugging.. Less good people are pugging… and all that does is perpetuate the lack of progression on the Guilds that just don’t have the numbers or the gear..