In which badges are traded in for epics and a hapless stranger is relentlessly mocked
Anyone else finding these random heroics quite addictive? They’re very ‘just one more’ish and I’m still finding the whole setup to be successful beyond my imaginings.
Is it just that the horrible players people talk about haven’t found the tool yet? Only time will tell.
1. This one was an early morning instance, run on my new death knight. Drak’Theron Keep, an uneventful instance with a friendly group of early risers. After this instance finished, I realised that I had 30 emblems of triumph so ran off to upgrade my green shoulders to … err… Tier 9. I think that sums up how WoW has changed in this expansion. They are shiny! I even bought a rare gem for them.
2. The Old Kingdom. This instance marks the first time that my Death Knight actually topped the damage meters in an instance. Baby’s first pwnage? Clearly those epic shoulders were dazzling the others into standing around and gaping instead of actually nuking stuff. Another smooth run until we got to the extra optional boss at the end where the healer had one of those healer-psycho moments and managed to pull all the mushroom guys and the boss at the same time. I don’t actually know how. Group disbanded after the wipe (I think no one could be bothered to run back in and regroup just for one badge.)
3. Utgarde Keep. I suspect the LFG tool is actively trying to cycle me around the different instances, I haven’t had a single one repeated yet. Another perfectly fine group which is a shame because it would be way more fun to write about a dysfunctional one. Upgraded my green leggings for the nice purple ones that dropped off the last boss. Sadly the LFG tool still doesn’t think I’m well enough geared to let me queue for ToC or the new heroics, which is a shame because they’re the most likely source for a weapon upgrade.
4. Grabbed my partner and queued for an instance on Spinks. We pulled Drak’theron again, and the rest of the group had already killed two bosses and was waiting by the third. I have noticed that people really don’t mind being brought into a part-completed instance with the new tool, probably because they’ll get their completion badges more quickly. Noticed that one of the other guys was called Pornostar (or something similar) so we mocked him relentlessly about his name, in the sure knowledge that we wouldn’t get kicked. But who calls their character Pornostar? Really, people, you manage to name your dogs and cats, your cars, your partner’s naughty bits and even your kids so I know you understand what names are all about. So why when it comes to naming a character do you just type the first thing that comes into your head? Non-RP servers are weird. I have noticed that I am much more likely to boss people around or poke fun at them when I am on my tankette, I must be more careful to use my power for good.
I am increasingly curious as to how long the positive experiences will last. Guildies report that lower level instances are more active also, so it may be that players now have a much better chance to practice group skills while levelling. Is it still going to be like this a couple of months from now?
Welcome to Spinksville! 
“upgrade my green shoulders to … err… Tier 9.”
lol
I had a couple sucky experiences today. On my tank mostly people going ‘Pull faster, pick up the pace, go go go’ and the healer then leaving after the first wipe.
Then my healer got into CoS when they were already at the first boss. Instance was very uneventful, but there were only 4 minutes left when we started the gauntlet. The tank really went for it, completely ran through the gauntlet. Elites aggro’d on me, I died, Arthas died. Timer over, tank runs back to Arthas, history repeats itself, and while I am dead, tank ditches group.
And yet, it’s still a lot of fun. I managed to buy my 75 badges helmet for me, and the T9 shoulders for my shaman.
It is very addicitive, and I’m sad that I don’t have more time to run heroics at the moment. I just managed a quick heroic ToC on my pally before lunch, and even during that not-exactly-peak-time the group popped after only two or three minutes. Really, only time will tell if things will stay this way, at the moment everyone and their grandmother is probably trying it out.
Addictive is the word for sure. I started my day with a “breath-held” moment as I pushed the LFG random button. At first nothing happened. A glitch or perhaps becuase I was just one of a million DPS. Then I selected that I would tank on my “not guite up to date gear” Off-Spec. Lights, camera, action…..I was sucked into instance aftrer instance. I managed to pick some nice gear upgrades for my main spec and off spec as coincidently ever group I was in was made up of other classes. I found this VERY strange. What are the odds of so many random groups being composed of different classes. Never once all day did I join with another Pally of any flavor. It was nice to not have to compete for pieces of gear. At the end of the day and 80 emblems later I realized my rear end was asleep and my puppy had peed all over the house.
“Is it just that the horrible players people talk about haven’t found the tool yet?”
Believe me..they have. I ran quite a lot of PUGs before the tool was introduced, so I’m familiar with how good the average PUG-member on my server was. I thought it was pretty bad, but those guys that inhabit about 30% of my X-Realm-PUGs in the last two days manage to be worse without breaking a sweat. I never thought it would be really possible to do 700 DPS with an average itemlevel of about 230..
“I suspect the LFG tool is actively trying to cycle me around the different instances, I haven’t had a single one repeated yet.”
If I understand it correctly, it does. While you could visit the same heroic twice that way, the chance for an already visited instance to be drawn again is lowered, according to Blizzard.
700 DPS@ilvl230 whoot!
If I’m bored healing vh on my tree, I switch to elven form and contribute up to 1200DPS@ilvl219 (while keeping everbody alive), depending on mobcount…
So 700DPS… ^^
I had overall good LFG-PUGs up to now. Better than most, I did without the tool. But even @ilvl245 some player still haven’t learned to follow some kind of killorder. “Get a mob an stick on it until death!”… I don’t like people that make me look/feel bad as a tank.
*puts hand up* yes, addicted to LFG-PUG 🙂
I did have reservations about joining them, because while a guild group is very forgiving of my 2 min afks with my child, I don’t think I will get that understanding from people who just want to get their badges as quickly as possible.
Only had 1 horrible group so far, otherwise my experience has been really positive.
I am finding it interesting to read about other people’s experiences 🙂
On the dreadful name front, on one of the videos for the new bosses on tankspot I was disheartened to see one of them was posted by a char named “Thegreatme” and he pronounced it, the great me! Then I thought am I being snobby as someone in my guild is called Themess but we all prononuce the “th” from three rather than the.
Also I found it hard to hear/understand one of the other boss videos on tankspot. I was wonderign are they gongi downhill, the much loved Cider didn’t so any of them.
Jsut to say loving your blog, apart from the Enchanting one as it is the first time I have had any money in WoW be selling enchanted vellums and I can see me making less money. 😦
So far I have nothing but love for the system, logged on with my Healy Priest and got to do a UP, VH, HoL, Nexus and my first ToC HC. The VH group was a little low on the DPS side but overall I never had a bad experience other than the usual “Oh ****” moments in ToC. I got enough badges to get my T9 shoulders, I just have to go off and grab them. The instances made a nice diversion from me trying to grab the last of my Thunderbluff rep.
I think from a design point of view the drawback to this mechanic might be the rate at which players consume content.
It’s awesome fun now while you’re upgrading from green to T9. How much fun will it be once you no longer need loot?
Against that it should make it more fun to level an alt.
But I think in several ways (mudflation, game mechanics, challenge level) WoW has become a dog chasing its own tail faster and faster.
I’m curious to see that too. What happens when the alt has full T9, after all?
Well, my alt is in a heavy RP guild on a RP server so I’ll plan to go roleplay with them. But what everyone else is going to do I couldn’t really say.
yes, it is rather addictive, but the bad players have found it… and are using it 😦
I’ve had 8 DKs in all my groupings so far, and all but one of them ended up on my ignore list. As a tank I take it as an insult when the (supposed) DPS deathgrips a mob or uses chains of ice on a mob marked for kill or during aoe. I really take offense when they also tell me how to play my class.
There have been a few other bad players, but its the mass stupidity of the DKs that really stands out in my mind.