Comments on: Dearest Pug,

By: Hugmenot

Hugmenot — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 15:45:00 +0000

Congratulations on 2-manning Gnomer!

My experience is the XP/hour is about 50-70% of normal when 2-manning dungeons, 90-110% of normal when 3-manning dunegons, and 110-130% of normal when 4-manning dungeons with friends.

The wife and I prefer to 2- and 3-man dungeons because we like the challenge and we are in no hurry to get to 80.

And once at 80, we do stupid stuff like 3-manning Heigan, Loetheb, Flame Levithian, and Onyxia with friends just as crazy as I am (but not completly crazy as we do bring a 3rd).

It’s not a playstyle for everyone but it is certainly an option if you are looking for a challenge.

By: ReversionLFM

ReversionLFM — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 12:55:57 +0000

Actually last night we twomanned Gnomer and it took so much longer than other runs we leveled about half as fast That was even with 5 quests to turn in. Even one decent DPSer would have made things much better. Of couse if you factor in how long it takes to manually GET to most instances then the math gets even more against undermanning runs. It is too bad the system does not allow for it.

By: Makabari

Makabari — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 01:03:55 +0000

Ah, I love a good fail-PUG story! I had never seriously tried tanking before this year but recently started levelling my baby Pally solely by tanking using the random dungeon finder. It’s been great fun, and I’ve been lucky enough to not have any really bad groups. There have been noticeably fewer of the gogogo crowd that I encountered a lot when DPS-ing with my main last year.
Of course, you still get the odd warrior who insists on charging into combat before you’ve had a chance to get solid aggro or hunters who will rip aggro from you at the drop of the hat, but I try to take these things in my stride. Unless you have a group of several really inept players you will invariably clear the instance at this level anyway, even if – heaven forbid! – you wipe a couple of times. It probably gets worse when you get to the higher levels (say lvl 50 plus) as that’s when you really need to know about group dynamics and teamwork.

By: Hugmenot

Hugmenot — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 22:11:52 +0000

Stories like these are exactly why I continue to 2- and 3-manned dungeons.

The travel time to the dungeon is a much smaller pain than the frustration which almost inevariably arises when in 5-man go-go-go group.

As an added bonus, you get to apply CC, and sometimes chain-CC’ing a mob! Fun Stuff.

By: Andy

Andy — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 21:58:05 +0000

Ahh the joys of low level PUGs! I think everyone should be forced to play a tank, and take some kind of Tanking Proficiency Test. If they pass that, they get to be a healer, and if they pass the Healing Proficiency Test, then and only then are they allowed to DPS.

By: Analogue

Analogue — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 21:25:24 +0000

I must add that FailWarrior in Deadmines followed up his promotion to tank by running to two groups, sort-of aggroing them, more or less killing them, and then running to the next group. Followed by this conversation:
Me: IDIOT
Me: I have NO MANA
Him: WTF how do you run out of mana lolz?

Me, mentally, sadly not said, “Because you didn’t actually TANK those groups. You let the group eat a ton of damage, and I was going nuts trying to bubble and save everyone, ran out of mana, now I’m drinking, and oh, I’m sorry you’re not dying on those trash there, gosh heirlooms are overpowered. You suck.”