Thursday, March 4, 2010

From Annoying to Fun, or "Finding the Silver Lining in LFG"

I queued LFG on my 71 mage, waited 30 minutes, and the tank, after our first wipe caused by the healer getting web-wrapped (i.e. put out of commission unless the dps frees him), suggests the warrior dps should tank instead.

I gently mention that the warrior dps queued as just dps, so we should probably just keep going.

We pull another group and the tank admits he queued as tank just to reduce his wait.

The warlock dps starts chewing him out for tanking as a dps, and I try to vote kick the warlock for making my censor filter go haywire, but it won't let me, so I say "7 minutes before I can vote kick [warlock]. /le sigh"

And warlock says "Are you for real?" And then informs me that if he's kicked, the healer (his guildie) will leave too. Healer says nothing.

I tell the warlock that I waited a half hour for a group and don't want him making the tank leave (this is the third pull and we wiped because the dps didn't free the healer, so there's no indication he can't tank).

The tank keeps trying to get the warrior dps to say he'll tank, but the warrior says nothing.

The warlock leaves after the dps fail to release the healer from web-wrap a second time and we wipe (I'd asked the healer to call it, and he didn't). The healer follows, the warrior dps follows, the tank again suggests the warrior should tank but posts just after everyone else has gone.

I'm too grouchy to stay, though if I knew he could tank, healers aren't that long of a wait to replace. But I know not to pug while in a Mood.

I leave group and log out and decide "The world needs more tanks."

So I head over to Moon Guard, hop on my level 28 warrior alt, and queue.

I get a group instantly and start to pull while we wait for a warrior to catch up.

The healer heals me. The dps damage mobs. I maintain my health through the magic of having a husband with level 80 tanking experience and a fetish for buying me gear with Real Actual Stats.

The warrior dps catches up and starts getting aggro on everything, like it wants to tank, and I have to fight it for things. It pulls by charging before I can get up there (husband warned me not to charge because too often it ranges your healer), and it takes us through every mob instead of skipping any. Eventually I give up and let it have its mobs while I have mine.

Before the first Gnomer boss, the warrior dps disconnects.

We 4-man the boss.

Nobody is pulling aggro off me anymore, and it's beautiful. Someone even compliments my tanking! O.O

We 4-man down to the final boss and kill it.

We all congratulate each other on a job well done (and on all of us leveling up) and leave group.

I pump my arm in the air, look over at husband who's running a 10-man, and smile to myself.

I can tell him about it later.

^-^

5 comments:

  1. Nice work! It's such a great feeling when you perform your role well and can FEEL it in the group. Everybody just syncs.

    ReplyDelete
  2. When a member of an LFD-formed group drops or is kicked, you go to the front of the queue. There is no wait time for a replacement tank. Sure, you might have to wait until a tank signs up but certainly not 30 minutes again. Your group will get the next available tank.

    We know that because Gevlon found a way to abuse it:

    http://greedygoblin.blogspot.com/2010/01/tank-trick-again.html

    ReplyDelete
  3. It's true the queue would have been shorter, but would I have wanted to continue with any of those people?

    ReplyDelete
  4. > It's true the queue would have been shorter,
    > but would I have wanted to continue with any of
    > those people?

    > We pull another group and the tank admits he
    > queued as tank just to reduce his wait.

    My comment was related to this comment. If someone queues as tank but doesn't want to tank, he can be kicked for no disadvantage to the group as you go back to the front of the queue.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ah. We all had a 7 minute kick cooldown at that point, though I'm starting to look forward to the cooldown removal in the next patch. I would have been more sympathetic to a kick for the tank than trying to heckle him.

    It was just a bad situation all around, I think. The tank sounded like a kid -- nice but clueless as to what he'd done wrong. And the warlock just vented his feelings in a very inappropriate way.

    ReplyDelete

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