Guild Wars 2

I appreciate your story but this seems more like a rant than a real question to me.

Lots of people can’t read so it doesn’t matter what you put in your lfg.

Wethospu.6437:

I appreciate your story but this seems more like a rant than a real question to me.

Lots of people can’t read so it doesn’t matter what you put in your lfg.

^This.

Basically, they didn’t read, and if they did and joined anyway, they’re just leechers.

Back then I would not ask for a gear check or kick people, but due to illiterate players and leechers I’ve realised that I can’t hope for a group of my liking if I don’t enforce a few rules. At least not through the LFG system.

Sad reality is that if you’re too nice, they’ll just walk all over you. Play how you want players breed “elitism”.

AnnieGYG.6842:

in preparation for higher fractals where everything will be a 1 shot so there’s no point to full PTV – you still have all the skills you need with zerker. I love the zerker meta, it means you actually have to use skill to stay alive instead of facetanking and it’s definitly more enjoyable for me to feel that bit of pressure in a game or theres no point to play.

Isn’t this (bolded) a contradiction? Or do you mean facetanking outside of high level fractals?

Rainweaver.7302:

AnnieGYG.6842:

in preparation for higher fractals where everything will be a 1 shot so there’s no point to full PTV – you still have all the skills you need with zerker. I love the zerker meta, it means you actually have to use skill to stay alive instead of facetanking and it’s definitly more enjoyable for me to feel that bit of pressure in a game or theres no point to play.

Isn’t this (bolded) a contradiction? Or do you mean facetanking outside of high level fractals?

*trying to facetank

Fixed.

AnnieGYG.6842:

I wonder if people who say “zerk only” in LFG without a gear check REALLY know what they are getting.

Many don’t without gear checking.

AnnieGYG.6842:

3 people who refused to show gear at all and typed why should they, (not sure why they joined a “gear check group”)

These people are the worst, they shove their ideals down people’s throats and cannot accept that there are just different people who likes different things. People like hanging out with similar people. In this case people who can read like hanging out with other literate people. If they don’t want to link their gear they should just leave.

AnnieGYG.6842:

So my questions are, what is actually classed as zerker and acceptable, what is an acceptable LFG to try and find a like minded group?

Basically full zerk top to bottom, atleast exotic with meta setups. Also, the right builds but can’t really check that.

AnnieGYG.6842:

I read here to avoid asking about APs and class and that “gear check” was the most acceptable way to filter to attract a like minded group

AP isn’t a very good metric since if person has full zerk exo with meta weapons and builds, he PROBABLY knows what’s up. usually just type in caps “P(n) ZERK ONLY” – the shorter the message the better.

Is gear check a waste of time because of the amount of time it takes you probably could have completed the dungeon already with a full settlers or PTV group?

Keep at it and definitely gear check, don’t be guilty on kicking people who are stubborn, just immediately do so. Add people to your friends list that you find enjoyable to run with and eventually you won’t have to PUG as much. It’s basically just like making friends through an activity. That’s where we all start, and then you find the gems where you enjoy running with and know that they got your back.

Once we needed 1 guy to fill a slot, we got a full PTV ele with 6 Soldier runes and signets. It was a good laugh. Signet Shout ele – new meta!

Your standards may be a bit too high. If i put “Zerker only” instead of “Zerker/Scholar”, i’ll usually take anyone that is “mostly” exotic zerker geared, even if they have “interesting” runes like fighter or dolyak. Finding zerker/scholar people with meta builds, 2 food buffs and separate stacking weapons are very rare in LFG. Sometimes, it’s also not worth the effort if you spend more time finding people than it takes to complete the dungeon (ie. if you’re only doing CoF p1 and nothing else)

Your experience is perfectly normal, as it takes multiple tries to get zerker people to join.

I really loved your list of various gears you got.

A guildie the other day pinged knight’s armor with superior runes of exuberance. I nearly cried.

But anyway, I have best luck when I go in with zero expectations. This is the truth, and i don’t know why it is. If I just put, fractal level x, path 1, or even, whenever I put “be fashionable” I usually get. 2 or 3 great players, and 1 or 2 … Not great players. But as long as those not great players understand directions…. It usually turns out okay.

That’s just my anecdotal experience.

I usually write a very very long msg with the paths at the end. Something like “Please be full meta berserker builds. Thanks. Also i am writting a long lfg for ppl who read. P1.” or something ridiculous like that.
A short lfg and ppl tend to filter everything you wrote and only see the paths you are running. You can make yours a tad longer by adding gearcheck to it.

Bunmaster.9734:

I usually write a very very long msg with the paths at the end. Something like “Please be full meta berserker builds. Thanks. Also i am writting a long lfg for ppl who read. P1.” or something ridiculous like that.
A short lfg and ppl tend to filter everything you wrote and only see the paths you are running. You can make yours a tad longer by adding gearcheck to it.

I actually like that idea. Still probably won’t work though.

Bunmaster.9734:

I usually write a very very long msg with the paths at the end. Something like “Please be full meta berserker builds. Thanks. Also i am writting a long lfg for ppl who read. P1.” or something ridiculous like that.
A short lfg and ppl tend to filter everything you wrote and only see the paths you are running. You can make yours a tad longer by adding gearcheck to it.

I also do this. If you can hide the path so that you need to put the mouse over it to see it, you know they were at least forced to read the text. Whether they actually comprehended it or not is another question.

Wethospu.6437:

I appreciate your story but this seems more like a rant than a real question to me.

Lots of people can’t read so it doesn’t matter what you put in your lfg.

Sorry, I wanted to put some context behind what I wrote as an example, nothing worse than forums posts which say, “Wut is zerger plox? – list runes 4 me” I’m a woman, I waffle sometimes :P I didn’t want the answer “Join dungeon guild or GTFO” or “Make your own group” I came here to see what ideas, feedback, experiences other people had in the game, was I being to harsh on kicking those people? do others who have to pug it have the same experiences? I did expect some trolling as a long time lurker in the Dungeons forums though.

Great ideas and feedback guys, I really appreciate them – putting the path hidden away is great. I’m learning to be a bit harsher especially in fractals so it’s nice to confirm others stick by their LFGs as well.

I know people don’t read LFGs in the main, but some do, and some are willing to learn. I’ve had 2 really nice WvW set up warriors come in to party for Fracs and when we explained why they were not zerker and suggested improvements like getting a second set of armour for PvE they popped out to grab a set of CoE armour and some ruby orbs and retraited – they were both awesome runs and the guys actually saw the difference in their gear and damage – so score 2 for the “elitist zerker noobs”

Edit for Rain, sorry, missed your post before, yes, I kinda meant high level fractals as in level 80 fractals, and facetanking to me meant stood there in front of anything spamming 1 in full PTV, no dodging or blocks and eating every single hit, appologies if I got the terminology wrong there.

It sounds like your experience is pretty par for the course, Annie. I’ve had runs before where I ask for zerker without a ping, and then see people stacking Life or Momentum. Maybe for AC it doesn’t matter and you can carry the bads, but for harder dungeons and Fractals I think it is absolutely fair to kick people and try again since you will be relying on them.

@op

Your experience is pretty much normal. People join knowing fully well they are not what you are looking for and feel entitled to freely force their own gameplay upon others who don’t want them.

There are also weird ones who are probably full zerk but don’t want to ping. I’ve seen a high AP warr pinging ascended zerk 1 armor piece with ruby orb to my friend mocking her because she was 1.8k AP, saying that’s all he’s going to show. We promptly kicked him lol(mainly because he judged by AP and is using ruby orb instead of scholar when he can clearly afford scholar runes).

As for which saves more time, it depends on how many people you have/know pre-made for the party. If you have 3-4 it usually doesn’t matter(you can probably 4 man it without much difference in time compared to bringing a cleric/soldier gear tank/healer). They might actually cost you more time if they don’t mechanics/conform to your setup(like say CoE, messing up all the LoS/cc’ing unnecessarily and disabling you from pushing alpha etc.).

Lilith Ajit.6173:

I really loved your list of various gears you got.

A guildie the other day pinged knight’s armor with superior runes of exuberance. I nearly cried.

But anyway, I have best luck when I go in with zero expectations. This is the truth, and i don’t know why it is. If I just put, fractal level x, path 1, or even, whenever I put “be fashionable” I usually get. 2 or 3 great players, and 1 or 2 … Not great players. But as long as those not great players understand directions…. It usually turns out okay.

That’s just my anecdotal experience.

It’s true.. some of the most flawless and smooth runs came from no party description. People just knew what to do. It’s amazing when you can breeze through the content and everyone plays well together. When I have put in requirements, it goes either way.. which I find strange. I sort of like pugging and can’t stop myself from doing it. I guess I am a masochist.. but it’s the element of surprise and the unexpected. Yes, I had some hair tearing, painful runs.. but maybe I will think differently when I reach high level fractals.

I do run a semi-meta zerker build but I won’t join a zerker run. Probably for the reason that I don’t fully meet the requirement with the scholar runes. I did get a third set of armor with zerker stats and I may put in the scholars to see if I am ready for it.

Lol, I tried pugging level 50 FotM the other day and there was a guardian AND a mesmer on the team yet 0 reflects. Also, 3 of them were using magic find food and boosters. I was the only person in zerk and I felt like I was soloing Mossman in swamp.

I ended up ragequitting in harpy fractal because of everybody flopping around like a bunch of fish due to the mesmer camping GS, guardian camping staff and being too scared to unequip his shouts, ele camped water attunement, and they even had a LFG post something along the lines of “Lvl 50 70+ AR experienced.” You’d think people who have full ascended would gear would likely know what the hell they’re doing, but evidently it doesn’t mean anything.

I really don’t understand people. Why play a mesmer if you’re not making use of any reflects?! Why play a guardian at all if you aren’t going to make use of not only the nicest damage output in some cases but the best protection as well (reflect wall)?! Why play a thief if you aren’t going to make use of blinds, stealths, or shadowsteps?! Why are the warriors in my pug teams planting banners of discipline when I already pinged mine and planted it… omg…

Sometimes I get pretty decent runs but most of the time I’m all like: http://i.imgur.com/bCmOqYH.gif

Your experiences sound pretty normal to me, OP.

maxinion.8396:

Bunmaster.9734:

I usually write a very very long msg with the paths at the end. Something like “Please be full meta berserker builds. Thanks. Also i am writting a long lfg for ppl who read. P1.” or something ridiculous like that.
A short lfg and ppl tend to filter everything you wrote and only see the paths you are running. You can make yours a tad longer by adding gearcheck to it.

I also do this. If you can hide the path so that you need to put the mouse over it to see it, you know they were at least forced to read the text. Whether they actually comprehended it or not is another question.

And I thought I was the only one. It actually works.

I was once asking for “native english speakers with communicational abilities” for an AC run. One and a half hour later, I gave up on it, as the best I got was:
“I Full PVT run cuz zerka all die no dps” when asking what gear set that person was running.

Lazy I agree with you pugging is sadistically cruel, and I also have a wierd attraction to it :P If I want a no expectations random run I go to someone elses group, however if I’m in the mood for some nice teamwork I put my own group up.

Purple, my friend had a simliar experience today trying to pug his 50 in the early day because he needed to go out drinking, 2 warrior, 1 guardian, 2 mes, 1 thief all 14+K APs – Bloomhunger he charged in popped wall of reflect, stood there bashing away – he looks around and the entire team is max ranging with GS/LB/SB – zero feedbacks or smokesreen or focus traited to reflect. They wiped 3 times and he decided better of it and left then to it.

Ouch Dub, that’s harsh I definitly would have quit trying to, I normally put Basic English but rarely get it, and if they do they are either the “Who the hell are you to ask to see my gear?” or yes, the old chestnut “Dead DPS is no DPS, bb zerk noobs”.

Regarding acceptable gear, would you guys say most runes containing 2/3 zerker stats are acceptable? Obviously Scholar, Orbs, Eagle, Ranger, Golemancer, even Ogre are perfectly OK in my eyes (cept in collosus Frac where you wouldn’t want random golems and rock dogs running free), but I struggle to decide when I see runes of Rage on a warrior (doesn’t he have enough Fury already?), or Runes of the Wurm, Citadel, Hoelbrak, Fire, Pirate, Strength – are any of these acceptable zerker gear check material or all of them?

Well, strictly speaking, to me “zerker only” means exactly that. Full berserker equipment (meaning armour, weapons and trinkets), but nothing more. Maybe with a slight exception for the back-slot item given that this is the most “complicated” when it comes to obtaining exotic+ grade berserker stats. (Although you can get a green one from your personal story, if I remember correctly.)
Anything else like scholar runes or meta traiting could be considered “implied”, but that’s basically it. It is, at best, implied, but not asked for. Add in scholar and meta requirements and you could expect the whole package. Could expect. As was already stated, people don’t seem to read the lfg tags that well… or at all.

If we factor in communication, then someone joining and asking if ruby orbs, some parts knight equpment or anything similar is acceptable in a reasonable way because they’re still learning the ropes or something like that, I don’t think I would mind that much.
I can however understand if someone doesn’t want that person in their group if they are aiming for a speedrun instead of a semi-educational one. So it basically would come down to wether “speedrun” was advocated and personal preference/ available time/mood at the moment, I guess.

Small note: I mostly wrote for normal dungeons and maybe low level fractals. Given the time high level fractals require I think any kinks should be worked out via communication before the start. But I think most of the above would still apply.

Yeah schloar runes aren’t mandatory when I search for zerker only groups. Expecially because if the player isn’t able to avoid enough attacks yet, running ruby orbs would have been the better choice. I’m also a lot more interested in wether the person plays “acceptable weapons” or runs riflebow as warrior for example (I still cringe when I see someone running pure Axe or pure GS). In that case, even if the person is full zerk, I’d rather take someone that runs a “decent weaponset” with “suboptimal armor”.

Great feedback guys, thank-you, exactly the sort of thing I was looking for when I ventured into these “dreaded” Dungeons fourms.

Sadly we can’t check traits becasue with all the will in the world and full zerker on – exactly like the guardian who I mentioned who was running Battle Presence and Strength in numbers – it’s all the % damage modifiers which really bring things home which he had 0 of.

I’d glady accept a guardian running 1 or 2 knights accesories, or a thief running 1 or 2Valkyrie, especially if they came in and asked – LFG is an extension of an English checker so the tip to type out very long LFGs might encourage this. Speedruns isn’t really the end game for me, the teamwork is – and with good teamwork invaribaly the runs are fast and clean but that’s a by product.

Wpns is a subject close to my heart because although my warrior (wearing big “L” Plates) is 90% full ascended zerk with Scholar, I have Axe/WH & Mace/Axe & GS (not really a fan of it cept for mobility) or longbow (which I only use for stacking might) but they are all full PTV or Sentinels from random Fractal boxes so I don’t personally feel right to join a full zerker group with him – or if I did I would ask first if it was OK.

The thing about gear is that if you’re traited right, As evident in naked runs, gear is secondary. Afaik building right is the most important. My elementalist has berserker scholar but if she is 0/0/10/30/30 I’m not doing what I should be in a group. Same with weapons. If I’m a berserker ranger it doesn’t matter if I’m running dual legendary bows.

Lilith Ajit.6173:

The thing about gear is that if you’re traited right, As evident in naked runs, gear is secondary. Afaik building right is the most important. My elementalist has berserker scholar but if she is 0/0/10/30/30 I’m not doing what I should be in a group. Same with weapons. If I’m a berserker ranger it doesn’t matter if I’m running dual legendary bows.

Pigbow is totally viable.

deSade.9437:

Lilith Ajit.6173:

The thing about gear is that if you’re traited right, As evident in naked runs, gear is secondary. Afaik building right is the most important. My elementalist has berserker scholar but if she is 0/0/10/30/30 I’m not doing what I should be in a group. Same with weapons. If I’m a berserker ranger it doesn’t matter if I’m running dual legendary bows.

Pigbow is totally viable.

Hehehe

Okay then! I’m not knowledgable of the pig bow grandeur.

AnnieGYG.6842:

Purple, my friend had a simliar experience today trying to pug his 50 in the early day because he needed to go out drinking, 2 warrior, 1 guardian, 2 mes, 1 thief all 14+K APs – Bloomhunger he charged in popped wall of reflect, stood there bashing away – he looks around and the entire team is max ranging with GS/LB/SB – zero feedbacks or smokesreen or focus traited to reflect. They wiped 3 times and he decided better of it and left then to it.

I’m cracking up visualizing this happening LOL

Almost as awful as the last time I had ever pugged TA up when I was still on NA servers… everyone on the team being 10k+ AP except for me and all ranging nightmare tree with dolyak signets, rifles, banners of tactics and defense… omfg…

Purple Miku.7032:

AnnieGYG.6842:

Purple, my friend had a simliar experience today trying to pug his 50 in the early day because he needed to go out drinking, 2 warrior, 1 guardian, 2 mes, 1 thief all 14+K APs – Bloomhunger he charged in popped wall of reflect, stood there bashing away – he looks around and the entire team is max ranging with GS/LB/SB – zero feedbacks or smokesreen or focus traited to reflect. They wiped 3 times and he decided better of it and left then to it.

I’m cracking up visualizing this happening LOL

Almost as awful as the last time I had ever pugged TA up when I was still on NA servers… everyone on the team being 10k+ AP except for me and all ranging nightmare tree with dolyak signets, rifles, banners of tactics and defense… omfg…

Something similar happened to me at fractals. There were 3 guildies and 2 pugs, one pug being myself. They all had high AP, almost double or triple mine. And I could tell right away that dps was very low in the group composition. I was on my zerker guard. I sort of suffered through the run until we got to Mai. People running around like crazy during cannon after I asked them not to run on the first wipe.. and second wipe with barely no damage to her, didn’t even make it to first cannon phase on the last wipe. I left.

AnnieGYG.6842:

speed run guilds don’t appeal to me as I need to learn and thirst for knowledge along the way and I find running in pugs I tend to pick something up along the way

Let me say this as someone who shares an unreasonable love of pugging – you still might think about joining a speed running or elite guild. You can still pug, but I find it keeps me more sane if I have a group of like minded people to share horror stories with. Also, I find discovering new strategies is more meaningful if I have a team to share it with.

I also think you’ll find that you can learn a lot in a speed running guild. The kind of people invested in pve are often people who, like you, are interested in experimenting and finding new strategies. While it can be cool to run accross the occasional pug who has a new strat, you might discover more by experimenting with guildies. Guildies will probably be more patient if you want to try “non-meta” strategies, and you may have more freedom to not only discover new tatics but develop some of your own.

As for pugging – for normal dungeons I’ve all but given up on asking for anything. Even if people aren’t set up properly, the meta strats for the on-farm dungeons are so well known at this point, that it almost always takes more to gear check then it would to just run. For fractals, it may be more worth your time. I’ve had 2 hour runs which ended in the instance owner rage quitting on mai trin. That said, I’ve had a rampagers staff ele show me a number of blink spots in the cliffside fractal. I may be less tolerant when I get into lvl 30 and 40 fractals, but for now I see pugging as an excessive in open-mindeness. That’s not to say I throw logic to the wind – I have yet to be convinced of the efficacy of anything other then full offensive physical damage – but new metas always seem bizarre when they are first proposed.

I would say, use pugging as a time to practice Bhuddist non-attachment and self mastery, and join a speed running guild for the times when you need the company of more like-minded people.

Zoii, next time you go to fractals, I’ll go with you. Friends don’t let friends pug alone.

SorrowsEmbrace.8120:

Let me say this as someone who shares an unreasonable love of pugging – you still might think about joining a speed running or elite guild. You can still pug, but I find it keeps me more sane if I have a group of like minded people to share horror stories with. Also, I find discovering new strategies is more meaningful if I have a team to share it with.

I also think you’ll find that you can learn a lot in a speed running guild. The kind of people invested in pve are often people who, like you, are interested in experimenting and finding new strategies. While it can be cool to run accross the occasional pug who has a new strat, you might discover more by experimenting with guildies. Guildies will probably be more patient if you want to try “non-meta” strategies, and you may have more freedom to not only discover new tatics but develop some of your own.

Well you got me thinking for sure with this advice, I guess I have preconceived ideas about 100% speed run “5000 gold a month! Zerk only NO NOOBZ” guilds, I imagine them to be full of people old enough to be my children raging that it took 1 minute extra for them to get their gold/lootz – simply motivated by gold – or with a massive amount of leechers joining who know where to stack and spam endure pain & hundred blades but arn’t particularly skilled in class knowledge. A friend joined one and found it be very cliquey, same people same runs every day – so as a new member you’re only going to be invited rarely on a run.

The guys I’ve met from more elite guilds, only 2-3 from rT and 2 from I think Lupi that have ended up in my pugs have been really great though, not seen any elitism, we’ve had good runs and great laughs – but at my age I really don’t have the reflexs, or illusions that I will ever be good enough to join.

The Mentors guild really appeals to me I have to say, not really sure why I havn’t joined it yet, guess I just want to get a reasonable base knowledge to build on before I do.

I do take the great point to post for “Pigbows only” to ensure the bestest meta run ever, unfortunatly my ranger is only level 54 (as I find it the most boring class ever – no offence meant) so I can’t try this out just yet – it does have a pig and a bow though, pig called “scuttle” and Boar called “back”. Blonde sexy male norns/humans only is another favorite of mine to post but often it gets filled with Asuras and Twigs

IrisTheCasual.3742:

Zoii, next time you go to fractals, I’ll go with you. Friends don’t let friends pug alone.

Iris, is this you I was wondering.. yes! I would love to do fractals with you. I was talking to the fabulous Arah mentor about getting together for a run with you last week. <3

Ive had best pug results specifying “link traits” or “write out your traits” in the lfg. Its slower than gearchecking though, and quite a bit more exhausting. I also got the feeling that im missing out on good players that are too shy to ask what i mean.

I followed the advice by Bunmaster and write a looooong advertise in lfg with meta build and zerker requirements. Fail, fail, fail.
Ofc rangers, staff guardians, rifle warriors as usual in full clerics / PVT / celestial, but even if a zerker joined it still used some sub optimal build, like AH anchor one.
Once a ranger stated that he / she hates the 30/25/0/15/0 meta build, cuz he dies too often with it so he used 30/30/10/0/0. I don’t know why. But it turned out he was a bearbow. At least the gear was zerker.
Or usually ping fire field in party chat and type “stack might pls” aaaand nothing happens not even with more eles. :C
Much frustration. So nab. Very playhowiwant.

I may have an unpopular opinion here, but I find that bringing a tank/support character when pugging makes the runs go much smoother. My friend and I don’t have a full time dungeon group, but we like to farm dungeons, so we end up pugging all the time. I run an off-meta zerker necro, and he runs an AH Pillar guardian. With some adjustments to normal meta strategies to take advantage of the tank, we only need half-conscious pugs (which seems to be all we get, with a few rare exceptions), and we can make it through in good time (compared to what you can expect from pugs, organized farm runs are still much faster than what we do) and minimal headache.

Of course, we never ask for anything in particular in the LFG, since we aren’t conforming to the meta, it isn’t right to ask that of others. So we probably get the rejects from everyone else’s group, which is why we seem to have such bad luck with pugs. But out of the few good players we have found, none have complained about our setup, probably since things go so smoothly.

Vethrfolnir.3195:

I may have an unpopular opinion here, but I find that bringing a tank/support character when pugging makes the runs go much smoother. My friend and I don’t have a full time dungeon group, but we like to farm dungeons, so we end up pugging all the time. I run an off-meta zerker necro, and he runs an AH Pillar guardian. With some adjustments to normal meta strategies to take advantage of the tank, we only need half-conscious pugs.

So youve given up on ever having really good runs, in favor of having mediocre runs at worst. Whatever floats your goat.

Rag I can imagine thats the only way to get a prefect set up, but like you said, the time invested is huge. I for sure do that if we are going into a level 50 fractal with 1 or 2 pugs, we chat through traits and skills, for one we can retrait to be complementary, ie switch to empowering might if no-one else them run it.

Vethrfolnir I symphaise with your view, before I was a WvW’r and to me as a “WvW elistist” back then, people who did PvE in zerker were just a bunch of noobs who didn’t need HP as they were only capable of playing agaisnt NPCs with predictable scripted boring attacks and didn’t play the real teamwork game agaisnt human enemies in hardcore WvW. But times have changed, WvW is more staff spamming in a huge blob super causal now, PvEs getting more teamwork with things like the Marionette.

BUT – just becasue other pugs are bad, why should it force you to carry them and force you to run a sub par build – screw them, you have just as much right to have a lovely full zerk meta run as anyone. It’s perfectly fine if thats what you enjoy but it’s like anything, once you get a taste for that teamwork and melting bosses in optimal meta groups then it’s hard to go back to headless chicken runs.

As a main guardian 99% of the time, the best advise I can give to your friend is to drop AH and to focus on blocks and blind to keep your team alive. Blinding an enemy or blocking an attack will save your WHOLE team more than him getting self heals. I only learned how to actually play guardian properly after I dropped AH. Keep AH in WvW when it’s guardians blasting waterfields which keeps the team alive with one of the shortest blast finsiher CDs in the game, but it’s really selfish in PvE when by retraiting you can be keeping your whole team from taking any damage by perma blinding enemies and good use of blocks, therefore they won’t need the heals.

To be honest I know the score with people not reading groups, and even if they read it they come in with sub par builds – I put this thread up to try and get some advice on how to counter that – I refuse to just give up on it (yet :p).

Reduce standards and accept sub optimal builds as long as they are semi zerker, just put Scholar or meta only in LFG, make really long LFGs with paths at the end, talk through triats, check weapon sets on entry (& bring pigbow) are all really nice advice so thank-you.

Please lets not argue in here, I don’t want this to be deleted

I don’t think Vethrfonir is that much off with his opinion. In a pug, even if you try to advertise properly, you usually have little to no idea what you will end up with in regards to team composition and individual gear/build/skill.
So if you pug a lot I can understand to opt for more sustain and a smoother run at the expense of some speed.
Plus, if you have a group that can’t pull off the meta tactics and some of the skips because they lack in the knowledge/skill/build/gear-whatever department, you are quite often actually faster with a sub-optimal setup (compared to a full meta/speedrun setup) because you have less wipes and/or waiting until everyone has made the skips. Or if you have to wait for your group to fill up with people that actually meet your requirements. (Granted, I have little comparison in that regard since I usually only do nondescript free for all pugs if I pug. So I might be wrong about the wait.)

It is of course an entirely different matter if you are usually running with an organized crowd that runs the meta.

Edit: Corrected a Typo in the wrong way wich gave a sentence the entirely wrong meaning. Corrected again.

Edit 2: I felt the need to elaborate a bit what I meant about sub-optimal setup. What I’m talking about is something like using obals fractal hammer build in a normal dungeon in the 15/15/0/20/20 variant. Usually the defensive parameters are overkill for a normal dungeon in an organized group. But in a pug they can carry the day if necessary. Another (though more “selfish”) example would be running the 25/30/0/15/0 variant for a thief. I’ve lost count how often the endurance return has saved my sorry behind.

Annie you’re freakin awesome and the last post of yours is a mentality that I wish others had.

AnnieGYG.6842:

…times have changed, WvW is more staff spamming in a huge blob super causal now, PvEs getting more teamwork with things like the Marionette.

BUT – just becasue other pugs are bad, why should it force you to carry them and force you to run a sub par build – screw them, you have just as much right to have a lovely full zerk meta run as anyone.

I only learned how to actually play guardian properly after I dropped AH. Keep AH in WvW when it’s guardians blasting waterfields which keeps the team alive with one of the shortest blast finsiher CDs in the game, but it’s really selfish in PvE when by retraiting you can be keeping your whole team from taking any damage by perma blinding enemies and good use of blocks, therefore they won’t need the heals.

To be honest I know the score with people not reading groups, and even if they read it they come in with sub par builds – I put this thread up to try and get some advice on how to counter that – I refuse to just give up on it (yet :p).

Hell no, never give up. If you’re on EU servers by any chance feel free to pm me at all whenever doing any dungeons or fotm (except AC, I hate AC) and I’d be glad to come. :>

Yes, I would like to echo Miku’s sentiment, because it’s true. You are the pug I wish I could get, and a very welcome addition to [Noob]. Also, Miku, I refuse to do AC too. So much hate in my heart for that dungeon XD.

Best way to pug is with a couple friends. If only a couple slots are pugs things are bound to be smooth.

Also, once I get to 80 on my EU or if you have an NA, I would love to join your pug roulettes, as we sometimes like to call them

I love AC, I just hate it the (subpar) way pugs do it.
Early AC runs (way before the revamp) were, aside of some lupi solo’s, the best experience I’ve had in this game yet.

@Purple
Whats your problem with AC? Kinder surprise from the troll? :P

@Dub
What kind of subpar way you talk about? Oo

Starting at party composition, going over to common stack spots and ending with generally in-combat skipping and waiting.

My old duo p1 runs took 4-5 minutes, nowadays pugs need about 10+. Still, in the rare ocassion that Pepsi and I are up to some AC, we average times below 9-10 minutes.
Even the current record of 5 minutes and a bit can be beaten by at least 30 seconds.

Thank’s for the kind words guys, I’ve just watched some of your stream Purple and erm wow, I think I’d feel out of my league in a group with people like you, it’s amazing stuff and I’ve found your warrior advice thread which is great since I am a learner driver on warrior so far, once my guardian has been taken to school my warrior will be next. I am really looking forward to getting down and dirty with [Noob] although I think I PM’d the wrong Iris with some questions.

I’m just a decent pug who’s bothered to read every single skill and trait my character has even if I’ve never used it – to me it’s just really basic common sense to want to protect your team from taking any damage at all instead of spamming heals, especially since healing power scales better on a thief than it does on a guardian.

Anet is right to be honest, unless the player base ups their game a little, forces themselves to read every trait, forces themself to read every combo they can contribute to, knows all their blast finishers, or even runs around for an hour with 3 random skills they’ve never used before for 20 mins in PvE jsut to see how they work there’s little point in making things too challenging.

Dub.1273:

Starting at party composition, going over to common stack spots and ending with generally in-combat skipping and waiting.

My old duo p1 runs took 4-5 minutes, nowadays pugs need about 10+. Still, in the rare ocassion that Pepsi and I are up to some AC, we average times below 9-10 minutes.
Even the current record of 5 minutes and a bit can be beaten by at least 30 seconds.

Could you link a video or describe how your stacking/skipping strategies differ from most pugs? I know some spots are suboptimal, like stacking at the pillar at rumblus without FGS, and on top of the rubble in the tunnel after spider queen (wtf? are these guys planning on ranging or something?), but other than that I’m not sure what could be done to speed up runs significantly…

@Lilith if that last statement was towards me then I’d be glad to :P

@Dub – Lupi solos for me are still really fun. I’d like there to be more bosses like him. He may not be hard to solo for me now, but he’s still a fun fight and some of my best experiences on GW2 thus far were from him too

@Delanor – I love the cave troll tbh. It’s everything else that kittenes me off — especially finding out at the end of the dungeon that we wasted our time and have to start over because of the kitten NPC’s glitching.

@Annie – I’m glad you had the chance to watch it if it was today, I’m sorry if I seemed kind of ‘hurr durr’ in my Arah run. I was actually kind of mad when I got disconnected on Ancient Ooze, when the people I was paying for tar help were idiots and not burning the boss (resulting in me getting encased in tar and losing BL stacks) and at how I was consistently getting 3 swarm spawns over and over again at Lupicus. RNG my butt. There’s obviously an Arenanet employee stalking me and hotfixing all the elite mobs to be illusionists that spam chaos storm and making Varra Skylark aggro them. -flips off laptop screen-

No but seriously please don’t feel like you’re not in the same league as me; sometimes people think that I would have a problem doing anything with them. The reality is that the I’m not even interested in joining any good PvE / boss / dungeon guilds is because Arenanet designed dungeons to be EASY for groups. It’s not fun when games are easy, it’s boring… I’d rather go in pug teams for dungeons any day than experienced teams.

As long as someone is at least trying and communicating I don’t see the point in raging at them. Silent pugs are ones that I can’t stand and based off of your attitude I can’t see myself ever complaining lol.

It only gets a little different when I’m doing FotM and I’ll explain why. In dungeons, I can go to char select and waypoint outside + re-enter if I die for whatever reason be it lag, fault of my own, trying to revive somebody etc. In FotM, I can’t do that; I have to wait until the kitten pugs get ooc or use a revive orb. Also for the most part everyone is reliant on blinds/reflects. Instead of them being helpful they are required in cases like dredge or harpy fractal. By the way I’d rather do dredge b2b twice than harpy fractal once. I hate it so much I almost wish everybody would just re-roll for swamp if we get it lol.

So, yeah. We can both be decent pugs