Guild Wars 2

FenrirSlakt.3692:

Intuneric.7652:

God, dont you get tired of those “stacking is fine, we dont need skillful gameplay, we want games that hold our hand and give us fast reward with little effort” replies ? I mean comeon we all got it that YOU think that stacking is fine. I personally dont think it is. But thats what i think and your point of view is what YOU think. So please do us a favor and stop crying because people want to some challenge in their game. Why are you even replying, you get tons of people stacking so you can play the way you want! Have fun. cough

Because challenge equals to going full PVT and kiting every enemy to death with ranged weapons.

The challenge is staying awake.

Laar.5476:

FenrirSlakt.3692:

Intuneric.7652:

God, dont you get tired of those “stacking is fine, we dont need skillful gameplay, we want games that hold our hand and give us fast reward with little effort” replies ? I mean comeon we all got it that YOU think that stacking is fine. I personally dont think it is. But thats what i think and your point of view is what YOU think. So please do us a favor and stop crying because people want to some challenge in their game. Why are you even replying, you get tons of people stacking so you can play the way you want! Have fun. cough

Because challenge equals to going full PVT and kiting every enemy to death with ranged weapons.

The challenge is staying awake.

Easily done with the coffee/energy drink exploit.

FenrirSlakt.3692:

Intuneric.7652:

God, dont you get tired of those “stacking is fine, we dont need skillful gameplay, we want games that hold our hand and give us fast reward with little effort” replies ? I mean comeon we all got it that YOU think that stacking is fine. I personally dont think it is. But thats what i think and your point of view is what YOU think. So please do us a favor and stop crying because people want to some challenge in their game. Why are you even replying, you get tons of people stacking so you can play the way you want! Have fun. cough

Because challenge equals to going full PVT and kiting every enemy to death with ranged weapons.

Actually, if you knew how to play without stacking, you’d realize that this statement only applies to a selected few bosses. Heck you can even do it without the PVT armour.

Basically all you’re doing is prove the OP’s point.

Goon for Hire.7150:

Actually, if you knew how to play without stacking, you’d realize that this statement only applies to a selected few bosses. Heck you can even do it without the PVT armour.

Basically all you’re doing is prove the OP’s point.

Just by being in melee range you are stacked. So playing without stacking would mean ranging.

Neko.9021:

You’re blaming the skilled players for making players bad. It’s this exact attitude that’s just so destructive.

By taking this line of thinking, it puts the onus of why players do poorly… on the people who are doing well. It just boggles my mind.

^ Exactly this.

@ Alice: You seem to be lacking knowledge that everyone else has. Since I’m a helpful (if somewhat conceited) person, I’ll enlighten you.

You’re criticizing Neko for not doing enough to help new players. Do you realize how ridiculous that is? He wrote a guide to help new players.

A lot of us “stacking-skipping-zerker-elitist-scum” have also done a lot to help new players. I wrote a guide to help them. I posted speed-run videos on gwscr.com that, if any new players ever bothered to watch, would help them learn efficient tactics. I’m a meta mentor in the official dungeon forum teaching guild. Many, many other players with similar mindsets have done the same things: writing guides, posting vids, answering questions, teaching new players, etc.

What I’ve noticed is this: There are a hell of a lot more of us helping new players than there are “anti-stacking, anti-skipping, anti-zerking, anti-elitists” helping anybody.

Anierna.6918:

Neko.9021:

You’re blaming the skilled players for making players bad. It’s this exact attitude that’s just so destructive.

By taking this line of thinking, it puts the onus of why players do poorly… on the people who are doing well. It just boggles my mind.

^ Exactly this.

@ Alice: You seem to be lacking knowledge that everyone else has. Since I’m a helpful (if somewhat conceited) person, I’ll enlighten you.

You’re criticizing Neko for not doing enough to help new players. Do you realize how ridiculous that is? He wrote a guide to help new players.

A lot of us “stacking-skipping-zerker-elitist-scum” have also done a lot to help new players. I wrote a guide to help them. I posted speed-run videos on gwscr.com that, if any new players ever bothered to watch, would help them learn efficient tactics. I’m a meta mentor in the official dungeon forum teaching guild. Many, many other players with similar mindsets have done the same things: writing guides, posting vids, answering questions, teaching new players, etc.

What I’ve noticed is this: There are a hell of a lot more of us helping new players than there are “anti-stacking, anti-skipping, anti-zerking, anti-elitists” helping anybody.

Exactly this.

I too agree, and have personally mentored more people than i can remember, from soloing to recommending builds.

FriskiestSpoon.6289:

Goon for Hire.7150:

Actually, if you knew how to play without stacking, you’d realize that this statement only applies to a selected few bosses. Heck you can even do it without the PVT armour.

Basically all you’re doing is prove the OP’s point.

Just by being in melee range you are stacked. So playing without stacking would mean ranging.

Let him be.
He probably doesn’t want to cheat by using the logical reasoning exploit.

Anierna.6918:

Neko.9021:

You’re blaming the skilled players for making players bad. It’s this exact attitude that’s just so destructive.

By taking this line of thinking, it puts the onus of why players do poorly… on the people who are doing well. It just boggles my mind.

^ Exactly this.

@ Alice: You seem to be lacking knowledge that everyone else has. Since I’m a helpful (if somewhat conceited) person, I’ll enlighten you.

You’re criticizing Neko for not doing enough to help new players. Do you realize how ridiculous that is? He wrote a guide to help new players.

A lot of us “stacking-skipping-zerker-elitist-scum” have also done a lot to help new players. I wrote a guide to help them. I posted speed-run videos on gwscr.com that, if any new players ever bothered to watch, would help them learn efficient tactics. I’m a meta mentor in the official dungeon forum teaching guild. Many, many other players with similar mindsets have done the same things: writing guides, posting vids, answering questions, teaching new players, etc.

What I’ve noticed is this: There are a hell of a lot more of us helping new players than there are “anti-stacking, anti-skipping, anti-zerking, anti-elitists” helping anybody.

+1 on this (minus the enlightening bit, as I’m not nearly as good as Anierna and don’t think I could enlighten anyone). Every time I’m feeling particularly masochistic, I go on LFG and take PuGs through Arah. Sometimes I have to carry them, sometimes they’re decent players, but 100% of the time, they’re grateful that someone is teaching them.

OP, I think I kinda see your point in a way, and forgive me if I’m misinterpreting. I do believe, however, that the fault does not lie with stacking per say, but with people only learning to do things one way, and that way is continuously reinforced by the vast majority of the player population, whether or not they understand it, and when something changes either on the fly or by patch, they’re not able to adapt. I know that I’ve personally fallen into that trap with many changes in game before I actually decided to practice and become a better player. Unfortunately, the average PuG isn’t practicing tactics or refining strategies, so when things change, they can’t adapt.

I would not call this a fault of stacking however, but a stagnation of content that, by its very nature, allows players to wallow in their own mediocrity.

Intuneric.7652:

God, dont you get tired of those “stacking is fine, we dont need skillful gameplay, we want games that hold our hand and give us fast reward with little effort” replies ? I mean comeon we all got it that YOU think that stacking is fine. I personally dont think it is. But thats what i think and your point of view is what YOU think. So please do us a favor and stop crying because people want to some challenge in their game. Why are you even replying, you get tons of people stacking so you can play the way you want! Have fun. cough

Oh, youre one of the funny ones, hm ? To answer your question, i usually dont even bother replying to threads like this because i normally don’t care about how someone else plays. I got my guys to play eith and thats good enough. So you want more challenge ? Go do arah without any armor, solo dungeons whatever. If you don’t get yourself challenges, go play another game.
I’m sick of reading the same content of b*tching around over and over. Thats all!

FenrirSlakt.3692:

FriskiestSpoon.6289:

Goon for Hire.7150:

Actually, if you knew how to play without stacking, you’d realize that this statement only applies to a selected few bosses. Heck you can even do it without the PVT armour.

Basically all you’re doing is prove the OP’s point.

Just by being in melee range you are stacked. So playing without stacking would mean ranging.

Let him be.
He probably doesn’t want to cheat by using the logical reasoning exploit.

Honestly, I won’t bother. There’s no reasonable debate to be had, only a handful of so-called “pro” players belittling and rediculing others for not seeing things exactly their way. Add the outlandish arguments (“if you melee you’re stacked”; seriously, what the hell?) and I can see myself wasting more time and energy here than is entirely healthy.

So you know what? I don’t care. Things haven’t changed for the better part of a year, and I don’t have enough time to waste on a useless internet argument. Unless A-Net changes how stacking works, people will believe that it’s the intended way to play, and they will fight tooth-and-nail trying to justify it. And, if more recent boss battles are any indication, the developers are indeed trying to get away from the whole “stacking meta”, which I personally can only see to be beneficial for the whole game.

So I’m just going to relax, lean back, and wait for things to improve. I don’t have any illusions about A-Net re-vamping the old dungeons but who knows, maybe they’ll surprise us.

GrimmR.3541:

Intuneric.7652:

God, dont you get tired of those “stacking is fine, we dont need skillful gameplay, we want games that hold our hand and give us fast reward with little effort” replies ? I mean comeon we all got it that YOU think that stacking is fine. I personally dont think it is. But thats what i think and your point of view is what YOU think. So please do us a favor and stop crying because people want to some challenge in their game. Why are you even replying, you get tons of people stacking so you can play the way you want! Have fun. cough

Oh, youre one of the funny ones, hm ? To answer your question, i usually dont even bother replying to threads like this because i normally don’t care about how someone else plays. I got my guys to play eith and thats good enough. So you want more challenge ? Go do arah without any armor, solo dungeons whatever. If you don’t get yourself challenges, go play another game.
I’m sick of reading the same content of b*tching around over and over. Thats all!

You’re sick i’m not. I’ll kitten all i want, there’s no denying that gw2 has lots of room to improve when it comes to AI and even you know this. Maybe just maybe the devs will take this kittening of ours into consideration when making their next pve content or sequel

:)

Lindbur.2537:

:)

Nice picture of the dungeon forum you got there

No Pulse.2967:

Lindbur.2537:

:)

Nice picture of the dungeon forum you got there

I knew someone would understand!

Goon for Hire.7150:

FenrirSlakt.3692:

FriskiestSpoon.6289:

Goon for Hire.7150:

Actually, if you knew how to play without stacking, you’d realize that this statement only applies to a selected few bosses. Heck you can even do it without the PVT armour.

Basically all you’re doing is prove the OP’s point.

Just by being in melee range you are stacked. So playing without stacking would mean ranging.

Let him be.
He probably doesn’t want to cheat by using the logical reasoning exploit.

Honestly, I won’t bother. There’s no reasonable debate to be had, only a handful of so-called “pro” players belittling and rediculing others for not seeing things exactly their way. Add the outlandish arguments (“if you melee you’re stacked”; seriously, what the hell?) and I can see myself wasting more time and energy here than is entirely healthy.

So you know what? I don’t care. Things haven’t changed for the better part of a year, and I don’t have enough time to waste on a useless internet argument. Unless A-Net changes how stacking works, people will believe that it’s the intended way to play, and they will fight tooth-and-nail trying to justify it. And, if more recent boss battles are any indication, the developers are indeed trying to get away from the whole “stacking meta”, which I personally can only see to be beneficial for the whole game.

So I’m just going to relax, lean back, and wait for things to improve. I don’t have any illusions about A-Net re-vamping the old dungeons but who knows, maybe they’ll surprise us.

kthxbye

Seriously, you were the guys who said that stacking means a lack of players skills. You consider yourself as being better because you can kill a boss without stacking! Well cool, i can do that aswell. So im not lacking skill but i stack, strange hmm?

Most of the “stacking is stupid, bad, etc” guys behave like " pro " players would force them to go their way but they don’t. Play the way you like but please let other players do the same without crying about fixing or other stupid stuff. ’Nuff said

it is kind of interesting how if a noob in an ac spider stack causes an aoe attack that 99% of the time everyone will just stand in it and die….even though by that time all the spiderlings are long gone and everyine could easily move out…. is this an example of lack of skill?

Iris Ng.9845:

50 units to the double-damage spot.

I meant from other players, not from the boss :o

If I cna put in my two cents on this, I might have a middle ground.

the issue isnt stacking in and of itself, I’ve heard from my own guild mates of hallways and the like where they would have one guy line up a whole group of enemies for an elementalist to go “boom” and own in such ways by stacking opponents in bottlenecks. Planning those bottlenecks takes strategy, and pulling them off takes tactics and skill. Those aren’t the issues.

There there the hide in corner tactic I saw in AC, against the spider queen…which was really stupid because the queen had are attacks at both melee and ranged, so she would hit the whole party at once, the only boon was increased damage on the players part, but not nearly as much as if everyone just surrounded here form different directions and opened fire. I think even simmon the digger from gurren lagann would call that kind of stack and pray ridiculous.

Spider queen does it again. There really is no end to this.

If you stack on spider queen in the middle of the room, she reacts the same way that she does when stacked in a corner. Fact.

Forget how she reacts, Lilith. It’s how fast I can kill her that’s the issue.

FGS in corner: sub-2 sec.
Ice-Bow in: sub-4 sec.

Those 2 secs are a big deal for me.

you’re right, but when you surround her in a corner you can scatter and dodge her area webs, in a corner, your entire party gets nailed in one shot with a ton of damage.
Why is this so hard to understand, I had this argument with a player in my party during my first raid last night. room to dodge is not a bad thing.

You don’t need to dodge when my Fiery Rush kills her in 1 sec, before she can even attack.

VideoGamermike.5813:

you’re right, but when you surround her in a corner you can scatter and dodge her area webs, in a corner, your entire party gets nailed in one shot with a ton of damage.
Why is this so hard to understand, I had this argument with a player in my party during my first raid last night. room to dodge is not a bad thing.

Oh. Sorry. My groups kill her before she can attack. So it doesn’t matter. We won’t get one shotted. Carry on.

And I’ll tell you I understand quite a lot thanks. I have one good mind brain yep yep.

Lilith Ajit.6173:

I have one good mind brain yep yep.

What happened to #OneGoodMindBrain ? =(

- Edit: I think we both messed it up though. The original wording was slightly different. Wish I could find the link…

kyubi 2.0

nudge nudge

Anierna.6918:

Lilith Ajit.6173:

I have one good mind brain yep yep.

What happened to #OneGoodMindBrain ? =(

• Edit: I think we both messed it up though. The original wording was slightly difference. Wish I could find the link…

Probably lost forever. Haha. RIP Swifty. The best mind brain around.

Yea, this garbage gameplay needs to go. I rather that ANet destroy stacking and nerf enemy hp to compensate than have this trash.

I think its more the hiding in a corner mentality. I’d love to see proper ambushes in hallways, but finding the nearest corner and spamming 1-5, again see AC example, is not an act of skill, nor does it promote good gamplay, being it promotes this idea of pushing DPS to the biggest extreme is can and forgoing all else. It’s the ideology that is foolish, not the act itself.

These threads are so pointless. Even if the vast majority of the player base was against stacking (which I don’t believe) anet wouldn’t do anything beeeeeecause… dungeons are not even remotely close to their top 50 priorities. I wouldn’t even blame them. Look at this player base.. the only time anet did something positive, good for dungeons (the AC revamp, which was a real improvement over the even less inspired bosses it used to have) it turned into a major sstorm and the number of pugs on gw2lfg just completely dwindled over night at the time. Horrible reception all around, so much that I think that the way the player base reacted to this revamp is the N°1 reason why anet didn’t even think of touching the other dungeons, rather than blaming it all on the living story. They focused on the living story because their metrics probably show that most of the player base do complete most of the achievements/living story content whenever they release it and I wouldn’t be surprised if their metrics for the AC revamp was so poor that they had no idea what to do next with dungeons. I don’t think they really expected what happened with the AC revamp and all the “it’s too hard” whine (remember, that was before pugs finally learned that they can do things like meleeing the spider queen..).

There is, simply put, no way for anet to win when it comes to such a player base.
This used to be the most common type of thread here before pugs learned how to imitate (but not always successfully) speedrun type tactics :
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/dungeons/Incredibly-hard-incredibly-unrewarding

I’ve been gaming since the early 90’s, I’ve played over 20 MMOs. The dungeons in GW2 are too hard for such little reward.

kitten ed if they do, kitten ed if they don’t. Why serve a player base like this when they can keep on releasing LS for the casuals and keep them happy with a high retention rate.

Yes, rather than blaming anet, the most logical thought that comes to mind is that the player base is responsible for the direction this game took. Anet is a sensible company, they need money, and thus, a good retention rate over their player base, to keep on going. For some reason the worst of all MMO players just chose this game as their rally point and anet had to oblige.

Nikaido, to be fair, the dungeon does have serious issues. The bosses are excellent, but are too hard for the first dungeon, and give no warning to how to fight them, or even indications of an attack. they were nice ideas but weren’t implimented well at all.
However yah…I do think Arenanet lacks the clear idea on dungeons.
If they want to save dungeons, I suggest they make them centered around ideas and mechanics prevalent through the entire dungeon, so when you finally hit those bosses, you have a general idea or some hint to what specifically to watch for AND what to do about it. There are dungeons like this and I’d love to see more, heck, even just a few minibosses with 1 or more similar abilities to recognize is all I can ask for.

But yah, there balancing issues people complain about(particularly necro and warrior) I think wants to be dealt with, as well as managing WvW and megaservers, and new trait updates, dungeons are likely on the backburner

VideoGamermike.5813:

The bosses are excellent, but are too hard for the first dungeon

What?
Bosses you can facetank solo with some toughness or in a party in berserker gear are excellent but too hard? Lupi is a good boss. Anything below his difficulty is “meh…”.
Alphard is some fun because you need to watch out for the pull, but aside of that I can’t think of too many bosses where paying attention really rewards you.

excellent in idea, the problem with them is there no warning at all. If you know what you’re doing there excellent, but you have to die multiple times to know that. The design isn’t the issue, its the accessibility that makes him too difficult for anyone not ok with dying repeatedly. Heck, even after being TOLD about it it took me 3 deaths to get the timing to dodge him at all.

I tell you, I can kill any boss in AC without dodging once.

I’m not sure if the issue is dungeon design, or the lack of proper instruction on that end.

Something I noticed about GW2 is that it does a crap job of teaching players how to do anything. That’s why we had players running around 14/14/14/14/14 builds. Players who have no idea what a blast finisher is, or how to use them well. Players who use orb of wrath at maximum range in clerics gear, because they’re too terrified of one hit kills to get in melee range. There’s no real indication if something is unblockable, unavoidable, or an instant kill, and it is frightening to players who, to the extent of their knowledge, have skills that don’t work right for arbitrary reasons. Worse yet, things like the sheath weapon key are unbinded, so many players will auto attack themselves to death against reflection and retaliation.

Anets stance on this issue is a bit troubling. In general, they say nothing, however they did once post saying that they want to push the difficulty of events slightly forward, in hopes that players will spontaneously generate knowledge of more game mechanics to compensate. You can tell I’m not a big fan of the “don’t teach, punish for not knowing” method of instruction, especially when so many players don’t know what they don’t know.

Dungeons are a learning cliff in this game. Without being taught proper techniques, players will run heat first into a wall, then throw up their arms in frustration. To this end, I can kind of see where the whole “stacking ruins skill levels” comes from. It’s wrong, though, since it misdiagnoses the problem: A lot of players will copy stacking, but with no real knowledge of how to do it properly they’ll fail at it, and the lack of understanding shows through. I’ve seen plenty of groups try a cookie cutter method, but once it fails, simply give up in frustration rather than trying something different.

It’s chicken or the egg again. The players never had skill to ruin in the first place.

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

I’m not sure if the issue is dungeon design, or the lack of proper instruction on that end.

Something I noticed about GW2 is that it does a crap job of teaching players how to do anything. That’s why we had players running around 14/14/14/14/14 builds. Players who have no idea what a blast finisher is, or how to use them well. Players who use orb of wrath at maximum range in clerics gear, because they’re too terrified of one hit kills to get in melee range. There’s no real indication if something is unblockable, unavoidable, or an instant kill, and it is frightening to players who, to the extent of their knowledge, have skills that don’t work right for arbitrary reasons. Worse yet, things like the sheath weapon key are unbinded, so many players will auto attack themselves to death against reflection and retaliation.

Anets stance on this issue is a bit troubling. In general, they say nothing, however they did once post saying that they want to push the difficulty of events slightly forward, in hopes that players will spontaneously generate knowledge of more game mechanics to compensate. You can tell I’m not a big fan of the “don’t teach, punish for not knowing” method of instruction, especially when so many players don’t know what they don’t know.

Dungeons are a learning cliff in this game. Without being taught proper techniques, players will run heat first into a wall, then throw up their arms in frustration. To this end, I can kind of see where the whole “stacking ruins skill levels” comes from. It’s wrong, though, since it misdiagnoses the problem: A lot of players will copy stacking, but with no real knowledge of how to do it properly they’ll fail at it, and the lack of understanding shows through. I’ve seen plenty of groups try a cookie cutter method, but once it fails, simply give up in frustration rather than trying something different.

It’s chicken or the egg again. The players never had skill to ruin in the first place.

This is basically correct. There is no reason why players should have failed the Marionette event time and time again— and yet it was hilarious how many times that event was failed. Dungeons are the same thing. I hope ANet is able to teach folks more about how to actually play the game with Living Story content like the Marionette, but I doubt it.

Lilith Ajit.6173:

VideoGamermike.5813:

you’re right, but when you surround her in a corner you can scatter and dodge her area webs, in a corner, your entire party gets nailed in one shot with a ton of damage.
Why is this so hard to understand, I had this argument with a player in my party during my first raid last night. room to dodge is not a bad thing.

Oh. Sorry. My groups kill her before she can attack. So it doesn’t matter. We won’t get one shotted. Carry on.

And I’ll tell you I understand quite a lot thanks. I have one good mind brain yep yep.

I bet you’re so proud, it really sounds like a task that takes immense coordination and skill.

SkylightMoon.1980:

I bet you’re so proud, it really sounds like a task that takes immense coordination and skill.

All it takes is a zerk, meta-build party and 2 FGS. You don’t even need 4. Or you can do it with 4 icebows/meteor showers. lol

If everything is so easy, why do we have people like Mike complaining then?

Because Mike is just bad.

Anierna.6918:

Because Mike is just bad.

Pshhhhhht…

i tink gaim is 2 hurd

gaim 2 hurd 4 me, gaim 2 ez 4 filty-leetist-zerger-scrubs. nerf de leetists and bufe me!

Anierna.6918:

gaim 2 hurd 4 me, gaim 2 ez 4 filty-leetist-zerger-scrubs. nerf de leetists and bufe me!

anuerna pls

ok, ok. just nerf leo. den we gud.

SkylightMoon.1980:

Lilith Ajit.6173:

VideoGamermike.5813:

you’re right, but when you surround her in a corner you can scatter and dodge her area webs, in a corner, your entire party gets nailed in one shot with a ton of damage.
Why is this so hard to understand, I had this argument with a player in my party during my first raid last night. room to dodge is not a bad thing.

Oh. Sorry. My groups kill her before she can attack. So it doesn’t matter. We won’t get one shotted. Carry on.

And I’ll tell you I understand quite a lot thanks. I have one good mind brain yep yep.

I bet you’re so proud, it really sounds like a task that takes immense coordination and skill.

I’m so very proud of my mind brain yep yep.

Darling skylightsparkle, please please don’t quote my posts and act like I’m the bad lady here. You don’t even know what i do, how I run…

Which is btw, RP walking, emoting at enemies, and owning everyone in fashion.

Basically, we have new #atse2014 as well.

So today, even though I’d already finished my dungeons for the day, I decided to pug a few of the more popular dungeons, just to see if pugs had improved. Guess what: they haven’t.

Every group I joined said “zerk” and “exp” somewhere in the advert, but they didn’t require a gear ping, and I could tell most of them were neither zerk nor experienced. Or if they were experienced, then only experienced in pug tactics, which as I learned are completely different from guild speed-run tactics. I’d forgotten that the disparity was so huge.

CoF 1: Mes knew enough to do the portal part correctly. But no focus pulling the initial 2 adds or the slave driver. No doubling might via Sig of Insp before gate, or feedbacking the last boss at the right time. I was on ele, and take a guess what the other 3 players were: Wars.

CoF 2: Mes focus pulls the slave driver to the wall, which causes him to bug via going invuln. He didn’t know the LoS trick that lets you FGS him without him going invuln. 1 person solo’d the Magg part, and the other knew enough to WP to start while that person unlocked the next WP. Semi-coordinated final boss fight; everyone got into position, then someone killed an acolyte and we all did the same. No “r” or countdown.

AC 1: Skipped Kholer, even though I said I’d FGS him in corner. The idea of killing Kholer was just too much for these guys. I waited until the last boss walked over to the wall before FGS’ing him, and 2 of the guys said “omg, fastest kill ever”

AC p3: They tried to skip Kholer, but came to the spot when I insisted we FGS him. 1 “omg so fast” comment for that. We had 3 wars in the group; at last boss, I asked “who will Fear Me! boss to corner so I can FGS?” … complete silence in chat… then I said “c’mon, we have 3 wars, someone must know how to fear!” … silence… then someone said “we stack here. I’ll pull.” So we try that; they stack on the wrong side of the wall (on top of the mound, not on the other side) and they pull the boss the wrong way. We wipe, since the way that they pulled the boss, my FGS couldn’t hit it. Then I tell them where to properly stack and I do the pull, and boss goes down in 2 secs. Amazing what a proper stack spot + FGS can do -.-

SE p1: Before we get to the boss, I ask: “Who will push? Guard with Banish, or one of the Wars with Fear Me, or me with LH 3?” …. complete silence. Then Guard swaps to hammer, so I assume he’s gonna Banish. Wrong! He starts AA’ing while I sit in the corner with my FGS thinking “WTF? I can’t even Rush if he’s not on the wall!” 2nd boss, guard pulls up WoR, but no stability, no Aegis rotation. On the last boss I say “let me pull with Arcane Blast, it has 1500 range, the 2nd guy won’t aggro.” So I pull him, then stack by the door and FGS. Meanwhile, all 4 of them are in the center of the room, and 1 of them says “pull him over here to lose aggro from other guy.” uh, what? Turns out none of them had ever pulled Tazza without Troop Commander aggro’ing as well -.-

CoE 1: I tell the group at the start: “we’ll stack in middle, in the left alcove. Thief, pull all the mobs with shadowstep, then put SS at the entrance to the alcove, then maintain Black Powder on top of us in the alcove. We’ll ice bow and LH.” Thief tries and fails. no SS, and patchy BP maintenance. We wipe. Nobody else had done it like that before and hadn’t a clue. At Alpha, I LH push to corner, but he runs away from me before the CC hits (never seen that before). Luckily, one of the warriors fears him to corner. On Golem, me and that 1 war are the only ones that interrupt, or know to stay behind him when he does his whirly attack. on Alpha, I put down an ice-bow, but nobody used it to get stacks off the adds that blow up before Alpha appears. They stack in the wrong spot for Alpha. I tell thief to bring Scorp Wire to pull Bjarl to pillar after he gets knocked back, so I can FGS him again pillar. No Scorp wire, no other CC’s at all.

I did a few more dungeons like this, joining “experienced zerk” groups (none of which happened to require a gear ping), but you guys get the idea.

I’ve taken away 3 things from pug’ing those dungeons today:

1) “experienced zerker” groups are NOT EXPERIENCED ZERKER GROUPS! If they are experienced at all (and they probably aren’t), it’s only in bad pug tactics. Most of them aren’t even zerk, since ping isn’t required. And forget about their builds – hardly any will be in meta.

2) Pug tactics are the biggest problem. Pugs do a terrible, terrible job of imitating proper speed-run tactics. So much is lost or twisted in translation from guild-run to pug-run. Doesn’t matter if the whole group is running zerk-meta builds and they ping gear, or they don’t ping gear, or they’re all in clerics, or whatever. The biggest problem is the deeply-intrenched pug tactics and a refusal to learn better ways of doing things.

3) Communication is an issue. In these “exp zerk” pugs, they all seem to know the default pug way to do things. If you try to coordinate something as simple as “who will use Fear Me?,” nobody volunteers, I’m guessing because none of them have used Fear Me! there, much less even knows how to properly use it. Even pugs have someone pull to a corner though, but most of the time, nobody says “I will do the pull.” More often, the pugs just stack in the corner and wait 4-5 secs until someone just magically pulls the boss for them. Coordination via party chat is virtually non-existent.

Conclusion:

All this means is that the zerk hate isn’t actually towards zerkers. It’s towards pug groups that claim to be zerk and claim to be experienced, but aren’t. Towards pug groups that use pug tactics and fail at communication.