Petoholics Anonymous

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

// February 17th, 2010 // 3 Comments » // Random Stuff

We’ve all heard the stories about pugs, even long before they implemented the new LFG tool. I’ll admit that I had never really pugged until the tool was introduced. If I wanted to do heroics, I just asked my guild and my friends to see who wanted to come along. More often than not, it was them convincing me to do some heroics. But since they added the LFG tool, I’ve been pugging a hell of a lot more.

There have been some bad ones, as I’m sure everyone has experienced. Xerin talked about some of his in the Ten Ton Hammer WoW newsletter, The Overpull. And poor Lodur over at World of Matticus has had some doozies.

My own experiences…well, I’ve had some interesting ones. Most often, we get that one dps who’s pulling 3-digit figures in Recount. But as long as they don’t start pulling mobs ahead of the tank, I usually don’t care. I’ve had a couple bad tanks or healers, including one that asked if our druid tank (aka my guild leader) had the right gear to be def-capped. (Pssst, druid tanks get all their defense from talents, ya moron.) He seemed to be having trouble healing the druid which I thought was strange because not only had I had no problem healing him before, but at the time he was also one of our best geared characters in the guild. And this was just H-CoS.

Surprisingly, I’ve had the worst experience with pugs that are below 80. For example, my little warrior Tuyok along with Kazi’s little warrior and another guildie on his druid decided to pug SFK. Kazi was the tank and our druid offered to heal but let us know that he had never done it before. A pugged pally that joined us was specced ret but said that she would heal because “i no wat im doing”. After some discussion, our druid ended up healing anyways. And he did a pretty good job all things considered. However, the paladin…kept pulling off Kazi somehow. For the entire instance. We still managed to make it to Argul without much incident. We nearly wiped on him because of some bad coordination but managed to kill him in the end. After the paladin had left group, we checked Recount just out of curiosity. Hand of Reckoning, which is the pally single target taunt, was 30% of her dps.

Let me reiterate that. A dps paladin used her taunt as part of her rotation. Either she was completely ignorant of what it did or she was an idiot. Either way, I was completely blown away. And this was the person who said that they knew what they were doing.

Then there was the pug that, in my opinion, was good and bad. It was H-HoL, with me on Niqo, Kazi on his pally tank, and our two fury warrior friends Jorgath and Barashi. All we needed was a healer so we decided to pug one out. We get a priest who quickly switches from his dps spec and clothes into his healing set up. Soon we’re all set to go and Kazi starts pulling. We quickly figure out that something is very wrong. The priest is barely healing Kazi, nevermind the rest of us. By the time we kill the second boss, we have learned that this priest has not only not healed before but is entirely not ready for it. Sure he has a holy spec…which does not have the 51-point talent and has things like 5 points in Darkness in the Shadow tree (which increased Shadow spell damage). He is also dressed in almost all greens, including some gear that has stats like strength and agility. We all shudder.

We could have kicked him. We were sure talking about it over vent. But from the way he was talking, I could tell this guy was a new player and it had probably never occurred to him to research his class. He had most likely fumbled his way up to level 80 solo with a lot of dying and no one to help him. What can I say…I took pity on him. Barashi had a level 40-ish priest he was leveling and as such, was the only person who had any kind of expertise on priests. So we started teaching him. Barashi covered the priest specific parts while the rest of us filled in the general information of how a group operates. He took all this information to heart and with complete soberness. Never did he talk to us with disrespect because he thought we were lecturing him. In fact, he thanked us numerous times for the advice.

The next few pulls showed some noticeable improvement in his healing but it was obvious that he just didn’t have the gear or the practice to heal us through to the end. So I jumped on Saraku and switched him to Holy. We gave the priest a task: to stay in his healing gear and spec and practice healing Barashi. And I will say that he did his job. His reaction time was still a little slow but I had to throw almost no heals on Barashi except on the last boss. We finished by reminding him to clean up his Holy spec and to get gear that was meant for his class. He thanked us again, and then we went our separate ways.

The priest wasn’t even from our server, there would have been no repercussions from kicking him and getting another healer. But…I dunno, it didn’t seem right to do that. It felt good to see him improve from our advice and to know that he was lucky to have landed with us. Who else would have been patient enough with him? I can only hope that he’s out there somewhere in better gear and a proper spec, healing up a storm in heroics and the like.

With all of this said, the majority of my pug experiences have been good. A lot of them are fast and pretty quiet, speed-farming their badges just like us. We have the 15-minute H-AN down to a science now with a good group. Kazi and I met a kitty druid on our server during a pug, who was so impressed by our healer-tank duo (with me tanking on Saraku) that he told us once “I’m going to glue myself to your shoe.” He has since accompanied us on numerous random runs when we’re looking for a solid dps and has made his way onto my friend’s list. A pair in the same guild from another server joined us for a random through H-UK and were nice enough to comment at the end that it had been the smoothest heroic they had been through yet.

Our friendly attitude might have been part of it on that last run. I squeed with glee in party chat as I always do when Kazi hexes the rider off his drake on the way to the last boss. And I proceeded to tell them how I make him do that every time we’re in there, which they chuckled at. What can I say? I’m easily amused sometimes. >.>

All in all, it’s been my experience that there has been more Good than Bad and Ugly when it comes to pugs. The LFG tool has certainly made it a lot easier for me to get emblems. And the teleport to dungeon feature is absolutely divine. Even if no one says a word the entire time, all I want is to get the bosses down in a efficient and timely manner. Meeting some cool people far overshadows the few idiots I’ve come across. Then again…maybe I’m just lucky.

Lame update title because I can’t think of anything funny

// February 2nd, 2010 // 3 Comments » // Hunters and Pets, Non-hunters, Random Stuff

My updates have been a little…lacking, so here’s a summary of all the things that have been happening.

On Saturday, we had our memorial for Vinny. Over 25 people showed up at the Shrine of the Fallen Warrior in the Barrens and we spent a couple hours recounting stories about him and giving a “KungalooooOOOOooooOOOooosh” salute. It was very nice.

My shammy Zulrea is level 78 as we speak, as well as Kazi’s warlock Basia. A destruction warlock and an elemental shaman are a scary combination. We keep lamenting about how we can only get 2 spells off each before a mob dies. >.> On that note, having Lava Burst always crit is awesome. Also, she dropped skinning and took up inscription…partially because I wanted a scribe and partially because Basia is a tailor/enchanter. So Kazi gets all my weapon/armor vellums.

Saraku is finally exalted with Netherwing (with much help provided by Kazi searching for eggs). So now he can transform back to his original drake form in character. Still working on Crusader dailies with him but not with much enthusiasm. He also has his complete T9 tanking set. I started getting his T9 healing set together but then I found out that I like healing on Zulrea better anyways.

Niqo has 4 pieces of T9, the Orca-Hunter’s Harpoon, the Felglacier Bolter, the Pauldrons of the Devourer,  the Crusader’s Dragonscale Bracers (a Christmas gift from Kazi), and the Recovered Scarlet Onslaught Cape. In short…she looks like just about every other hunter who’s done a ton of randoms. I’m quite satisfied about my 3.7-4k dps with a BM spec in heroics, with it spiking on the bosses when I pop my cooldowns and trinkets. Also, the redesigned Misdirect + Volley is sooooo nice. It really helped tanks in H-HoR before they nerfed the damage. Oh, and she got her “the Patient” title which is quite suitable for her RP-wise.

I rolled a fury warrior called Tuyok who now is level 25 and has 4 pieces of heirloom gear equipped. In character, he is Mysthowl’s and Niqora’s adoptive teenage son and his full first name is Issorartuyok. Try saying that five times fast. It’s the Inuit word for “leader dog”. He’s pretty much the character that I play solo when I’m not doing something with the people of BR.

Kazi and I have been talking about what characters we’re going to roll when Cataclysm comes out. I’m going to roll a worgen druid to be paired with his worgen hunter (with a wolf pet of course!) and a goblin hunter with his goblin priest/mage. We decided to reserve our names and because my 10 character slots on Wyrmrest Accord where already taken…I needed to clear up two spots. The first one to go was Fawnel, my tauren druid who wasn’t getting played anyway. My hope is that the worgen will have some sort of wolf-like cat form which will help me enjoy playing a druid more. Choosing the second character to delete was tough but I finally settled on Brighit, my draenei hunter. I play her even less than Fawnel and once I do start playing a little bit on Alliance side with the expansion, my focus is going to be solely on my druid. So it was hard to let her go but at least I’ll be making a goblin hunter, right? Right? >.> I’m currently debating between a raptor or a bear for her. I do love raptors and they have similar personalities to goblins. On the other hand, a giant bear with tons of explosives strapped to it does make a rather intimidating and funny image. Have I mentioned that the goblin is going to be half out of her mind?

Bloodriver as a guild is working on making our way through Ulduar and we’ve dipped our toes in TotC and Onyxia. We’ve come up to Freya on our last Ulduar run and we haven’t tried to get Ony down again since 3.3.0 came out. So I think that next time we go in there, we’ll be able to take her down. We also have a sister guild on Alliance side called Obsidian Phoenix that is slowly filling up with people who have Ally characters. That’s where our worgens will find their home.

And last but not least…I got a Logitech G11 keyboard. The blue LED lights are so very pretty and shiny. Plus the macro keys have given me a noticeable improvement in Niqo’s dps. I’d be completely pleased with it if the keys didn’t seem to randomly stop working when I switch characters (I blame the program, not the keyboard itself).

Patch 3.3.2 is all loaded up and I’m eager to get home for work and see what new things await for me. I heard there’s been a buff for elemental shamans.

Now hopefully my next update will come before Cataclysm is released. >.>

In Memory: Vinny

// January 29th, 2010 // 5 Comments » // Random Stuff

On Sunday night, I got a whisper from Myst giving me some awful, awful news. Our long-time guild mate, Vinny (aka Solarion aka Ebonwind) had passed away just a couple hours before. Everyone was in a complete shock. He was so young and vibrant that we had never suspected a thing. We had just raided with him the night before, and someone had even talked to him that afternoon. It was just so sudden.

Here it is a few days later and I still don’t think I’ve come to terms with it. A part of me is still expecting him to log on and yell “Surprise!” in guild chat. He was almost always  in vent, even if he wasn’t on WoW. It’s so very quiet without him.

There are so many things I remember about him. How he would sing that corn nuts song over vent or yell “Kungaloooooosh!” at random. One of my favorite stories about him was when he was wandering through Orgrimmar with his lowbie tauren warrior Ebonwind and suddenly a level 80 Alliance death knight raced past him, trying to get away from the guards and the other players. He attacked…and landed the killing blow on the DK. For about a month, he would randomly assume his deep Ebonwind voice and say “Poomf! …Fucking death knight.” It always made me laugh.

What I remember the most clearly though was just how he was always there for everyone. He would run alts through dungeons, provide services to guildies without payment, make suggestions for events and such, and greeted and talked to everyone. Whenever he would notice that I was down, he would whisper me and let me know that I could talk and rant to him whenever he wanted. Even when he quit WoW for a while, he would still talk to me over Xfire, even trying to convince me to join him in City of Heroes. When he came back to the game, he said that the reason he did so was because he missed us.

His funeral is today and being in another country and without a passport or the money, I can’t be there. But that doesn’t mean I can’t honor who he was. He was brash and crazy…but we all loved him for it. My characters are proudly going to wear the guild tabard he designed. And I am going to hope that Bloodriver and our new Alliance sister guild Obsidian Phoenix do him proud.

One day, Vinny, we’ll meet again on the other side. I promise to play City of Heroes with you then.

It’s like a powder keg

// October 19th, 2009 // 4 Comments » // Random Stuff

Now I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again… Bloodriver is THE best guild I have ever been in, bar none. We may be scattered all across North America (and even a member in Japan) but I consider these people friends, some of them even better friends than I’ve had outside the game. We’re a pretty close-knit group that’s crazy and funny but we are more than willing to support each other in whatever way we can. We’ve dealt with unemployment, evictions, divorces, and a host of other life crisises that have only made us stronger. But lately there has been a new problem that I for one don’t know how to address: people that don’t care.

One of the fairly active members recently brought a couple of friends she knew IRL into Bloodriver. For the most part they’re eager to join in with all our craziness and just have fun. However, I’m getting a feeling in the pit of my stomach that one of them has a less-than-friendly attitude toward us. Let’s call them Joe. There hasn’t been anything Joe said that has been outright hostile. It’s just a feeling that Joe is using us.

The others from Joe’s group are nice and friendly when Joe is not around but when he is, they all seem to retreat behind a wall of silence and apathy. For whatever reason, they seem to follow Joe. This unfortunately leads to some problems with participation. We do try to seek out members for events such as heroics and raids but because this group has ignored us several times, we’re less inclined to ask them the next time. And then one day they wonder why they’re being so left out.

There have also been moments where this group would come to an event, only to leave at the first opportunity after they got what they wanted. How are we suppose to make people like that feel like they’re part of Bloodriver when they only serve themselves?

For a little while, I had wondered if maybe they were acting this way because we were leaving them out. You see, quite a few of us chat on Vent a lot and often Vent is the first place we ask for people to participate in heroics and such. But after talking to some of the other officers, I realized this is not the case. For an example, we have one member who often has headset problems so she’s not on Vent most of the time. However, she is a very active member…whether it’s through talking in guild chat, helping out other members, or making it known that she’s always willing to join us for our crazy heroics and raids. Being left out has nothing to do with Vent and everything to do with not interacting with the other members.

Regardless, Joe and his group leaves us with a predicament. If anyone says anything about it, it might cause waves with the active member that invited them in the first place. But the thought of someone using the overtly kind members of Bloodriver just depresses me. I’m sure the others in Joe’s group are feeling left out and they don’t realize why this is. But I have a feeling that Joe doesn’t realize that this is a group of friends, not a bunch of people who are there just to further their own goals like it would be in a raiding guild.

At this point in time, my thoughts are that the best strategy is to watch it closely but take no direct action. This is a possibly delicate situation, where the last thing I want to see is it devolve into some guild drama.

So my readers, what is your advice for such a situation?

P.S. Sorry if this post seems unorganized, I was trying to get multiple thoughts down at the same time.

Linkback: Kazimierz’s blog – Totems and Technology

// October 19th, 2009 // 2 Comments » // Random Stuff

So apparently if I drop enough hints (if you consider saying outright “You need to start a blog” a hint), eventually Kazi will listen to me.

Jokes aside, Kazi has several wonderfully written posts about his shaman’s early life, so for those of you who appreciates WoW roleplaying (including myself) or just a good story, you will find them very entertaining and a great read.

I think he deserves some more readership love so drop by his blog and give him a warm welcome to the blogosphere!

Now I feel inspired to write some more character history myself.