How many wipes do you give a PUG?Follow

After my latest H ToC (5 man) PUG fiasco, it got me thinking about whether my behavior is normal or abnormal. I typically give a PUG 3 wipes on a boss before I call it quits, unless I see that we're making good progress and getting close to downing the boss.

I left my last H ToC PUG after our 3rd wipe on the Black Knight in which I was tanking and got 0 direct heals (Earth Shield and Gift of the Naruu only) from our resto shaman, who acknowledged that he was ready before the pull. I lasted 12 seconds. When I announced that I was displeased and leaving, I received nothing but nasty tells about how I was "********" the other 4 people in the group by leaving half-way through.

I'm just curious how many wipes other people give a PUG before they bail from a bad situation.

Edited, Aug 19th 2009 1:35pm by CamelToad

Depends on the atmosphere of the PUG, if everyone is friendly and up for it i'll keep going for as long as the atmosphere maintains. To me everyone being nice and friendly is sometimes more important than the speed of the PUG, i can leave a pug thats wiped 10 times feeling happier than a PUG that hasn't wiped but somone has been ***** the whole way through.

Sometimes one. Sometimes several. As others have said, it depends on what else is going on in the group besides the wipe.

There are certain things that happen in groups that inspire a certain amount of confidence that you're with competent people. There are also certain things that happen that just scream idiocy on the horizon.

I don't mind repair bills due to accidents, raid progression, or the occasional "whoops" moment. I do tend to become irritable when the repair bill starts adding up due to not more than sloppy play. I've made a number of people rather unhappy with me over the last couple of weeks with my shaman because I'll just up and leave a group that is not performing to a certain minimum reasonable standard. A sure way to have me leave a group after one wipe is to send me in to reg ToC with an overgeared group and wipe on trash.

A lot of it depends largely on my role in the group. As dps, there's an awful lot that goes on that I have little/no control over. As a tank in WotLK, as long as the healer is alive and competent, all of my dps can get themselves gibbed and I can still finish off whatever we were fighting when everything went haywire. I find that I leave a lot more groups when I'm there as dps than I do when I'm tanking...typically because things tend to go sideways a lot less when I'm the one responsible for containing the situation.

I agree with everyone else. It varies. If I can tell people are making a reasonable effort I'll give it a while (though I'll still eventually quit when it becomes obvious we'll never clear what we were trying to do), but if we keep wiping over silly **** or stupid people I excuse myself early. I don't owe the other people in the raid enough to keep throwing away gold on repair bills because of one or two bad players.

It depends on the attitude and feel of the group for me. If I am in a group with people who I feel are generally doing their best and aren't being jerks, then I don't mind staying until the group decides to call it quits together.

I had the worst H ToC Pug run last night though. We had two DPS from the same guild who from the very getgo were telling people how to play their class. I generally ignore these remarks and do my thing, because I feel that I have a very solid understanding of my class and how to play a tank.

Well, the crap hit the fan several times during the instance, and some people made very stupid mistakes. The ret pally, who was our other DPS that was not in the guild with the other two, BUBBLED me during phase 2, completely resetting my agro table and making me not be able to use any abilities. Although it was quite a stupid mistake, crap happens, and I wasn't upset. However, the two other DPS trashed him. We wiped a couple more times and then the two DPS started blaming the healer.


Regardless, we finally get to the Black Knight. We wipe again, and one of the two DPS kick the Paladin, apparently because our reason of failing was all of his fault (according to them). They replace him with a "good" DPS, and we go in again. Wipe two more times. Then the two DPS say "Fail, worst group ever! You guys suck!" and leave.

Again, I try and avoid these kinds of comments, but it got to me this time. I promptly messaged one of the guys that left and asked said something like, "Are you guys really blaming this on me? We did have a few weak links, but I sure as heck did my job". He responded saying that I was having a hard time maintaining threat? Seriously? The only time I lost threat was when the paladin bubbled me, and there was nothing I could do about that. I then told him that I hope that his blame it on everyone else attitude brought him far in life, and /ignored him.

Was I wrong? Regardless, I think I've decided that I am giving a 2-3 wipe limit when I'm grouping with douchebags. Or perhaps I will kick the jerks and find some decent mannered people instead.

Thanks to everyone who responded. I'm glad I'm not alone in my lack of tolerance for bad PUGs, nor was I out of line in leaving. I know that there are plenty of idiots out there, and I can genrally deal with that. I can put up with a decent amount of BS, which I expect in PUGs, but when you get the feeling that this is just going to be an expensive and frustrating experience, that's usually when I decide to leave.

I'm still curious about reading what other people do, so keep posting with your experiences.

Thanks,
Camel

Tank in heroics is the most involved person. You don't get to type to guild or friends on fights because couple GCD lost at beginning of fight means someone has aggro that should not. You don't get to have breaks between pulls. In fact you have to try to do as much chain pulling as possible. Give people as little time to get distracted as possible, that's my motto. All in all being a tank (and 99% of the time leader of group) means that you are busy ALL the time. Some people don't like that. Some people don't like directing others or being person fully responsible for preventing wipes.

We have to think about much more than "keeping things" on us. Always look at positioning of mobs. Do they have aoe behind them that prevents melee from standing behind them to avoid parries? Is one mob caster/healer and needs to be locked down? How to navigate whole group and get them to stand in front of you while you grab caster that stands far away. Does my healer have enough mana to heal me through next pull. Do I have to mark one mob in next pull for burning to ease up healing or interrupt mob heals? That's the things that have to go through background of your brain if you want to be decent tank. Great tank anticipates everything as well. He acts before it happens or has finger on exact keybind that saves from wipe by the time something goes wrong. All this happens while you do your rotation. It can be hard or easy. Depends on how good are you at doing things at the same time.

All I'm saying is that tanking is much more complicated than what it lokks from outside. My personal opinion is that everybody should tank something demanding at least once. To see how it is.

Just as a quick note. I noticed someone say above they reset the first encounter in ToC, and there's an incredibly simple way around that. No having to fuss with running all around trying to grab things. When you're down to the last mob, hop off your mount and throw your weapon on...and just use this time to taunt the two downed mobs. Run over to them while they're laying on the ground and whack them a few times. You will still generate threat, and it will carry over into the phase switch. When they dismount the 3rd NPC..taunt it. Voila. You now have an extremely solid starting threat lead on the entire pack.

I wipe until I am clean. I guess you could have a set number and keep wiping even after you are clean, but... stopping when still dirty... gross.

Granted I don't specifically play a warrior, but this is relevant.
In all cases, I will specify a reason why I am leaving an unfinished instance. Usually it has to do with someone straight up not doing their job, or half assing their job.
In the OP's case, I would explicitly tell the healer that (s)he is doing their job poorly, in a manner offering constructive criticism. If the healer does not accept the advice, or treats it as an insult, I will tell the rest of the group why I am leaving, or kicking a player out which would generally be the case if I was tanking. I'd then find a healer looking for a free emblem and possibly the (heroic) daily.

Flaminroid. It wasn't, but that could have been me!! (tank with 24k HP who couldn't hold aggro)
That fits the description of my first heroic tank attempt. I got kicked tho, by a very rude bunch. I'm still not good, but much better. All it takes is practice, and people who aren't acting like this is anything more than just a game.

Keep hunting tho!

I can't tell you specifically senoralac, as I don't know what HP you're running at, but there is definitely a point in time where it's safe to stop stacking survivability inside 5 mans and switch over to other sets. In my raid gear I'm at 39.4k unbuffed, but this drops considerably in 5 mans. My 5 man set only sits at around 29k unbuffed, but the trade is that while also remaining hit and expertise capped, I sit at around a 30% block rate with 2800 block value, in addition to a healthy bit of AP. I mitigate most physical damage inside heroics with the block, while also dealing pretty large TPS/DPS with damage shield and my own attacks.

If you're going that route, however, don't focus on crit. Get your expertise and hit caps first, and then focus on strength and block value gearing.

Left a group after we wiped three times before the first boss in Azjol-Nerub (so I didn't lock the instance for them at least).

I wasn't the tank, but the healer - same difference, though.

The tank had apparently never done the instance before, kept standing with his back to the mobs, hitting everything but the Skirmishers and Shadowcasters, and no one bothered destroying the web trap I kept getting snared in. Healer trapped = zero heals. Learn it.

Edited, Sep 19th 2009 3:05am by Mazra