My bone with it is that its just exactly suited to the age of spin and image we live in now. People get by this way in life, but I prefer honesty, in both WoW and EQ2 I’ve always been up front with what the situation is if I’ve not done something before or why I’ve screwed up.

Starting off like that people can start to trust you, in EQ2 its never been a problem this way (when people have advertised for a tank I’ve replied back and given them an idea of my gear level if I had any doubts, often the healer then would be the one who okay’d me ).

But in WoW when I last played it was starting to become one, the faster runs and whole mentality of it going away from being a challenging dungeon with a storyline full of powerful creatures that need to be overcome, and just treated as some sort of loot assault course to be completed in a fast time.

Its been an unwelcome change from the TBC heroics that people certainly respected, the easier they make the heroics too the worse the problem seems to be.

Maybe the root problem is that the heroics need to be something you can progress through instead of raiding (which is how it is in EQ2, dungeons range from easy-medium to rock hard requiring T2 gear). Instead the heroics have become a hoop that people have to jump through over and over again to access the loot to access new raids. I was bored of them already when I had a full set of T7.

That wasn’t my biggest concern with the new LFG tool, it was the effect it’ll have on social connections which was the only thing keeping me in WoW a while ago, and the only thing that is a draw to come back. So without these social connections the game is dead to me.

And that’s the issue, new players will now group up quickly and automatically with the correct group of other players. Now people don’t need to chat in LFG, ask people if they are the right spec, figure out where to travel or all the other little things that get people talking.

That’s my second biggest concern to the fact that it is then cross server, so now if you find this great group of people (or great person) you really like after the dungeon run is over they are never to be seen again. I know that I found my guild because of a group that formed in Arathi Highlands to kill an elite, that will not happen anymore. I found most of my friends running dungeons (and struggling which was fun!), with the dungeon finder that won’t happen anymore.

So now its solo to the end level and raid or die, if all my friends left the game I’d not consider playing again. Really not sure now especially when an expansion price gets factored in.

Of course the pre-60 Instances don’t require a whole lot of strategy and a Pally Tank usually means “Round ‘em up and AOE ‘em down!” and for the most part that works. I’ll be hitting Maraudon this week, one of the Instances I’m less familiar with. That one is going to be interesting

On the other hand, the group is supposed to not make it feel as though I was playing solo.

I cheerfully have 2 tanks that I run instances with. The Bear is a joy, as can I frankly ignore the rest of the party and storm ahead spamming swipe all the way. The DK is a different matter entirely.

In particular I’ve seen on a couple of occasions, I’ve asked a less-geared member of the group if they know the tactics. The exchange usually goes something like:

“[name], do you know what you’re doing on this boss?”
“No”
[name] has left the group.

Some people are so afraid of being thought of as being incompetent that they take any suggestion that they might be as a mortal insult.

The game needs to be better. It’s simply not acceptable to require that a fresh level 80 learn _48_ or so boss encounters (16 dungeons * 3 bosses) before they ever click that “random dungeon” button.

(And, by the way, the reason people don’t ask is because as dps you can fake it on 40 of the 48 bosses. This also decreases the returns on any research you do.)

Five man dungeons can be hard. They must, however, never be hard to understand.

One thing that comes home to me is that it’s very difficult to teach people in a random group, even if you are helpful and inclined to explain stuff. I will be curious to see where this all leads in the next expansion.