Practice in Oblivion

I just had to write a post today just to get this out of my system.  Actually it is already out of my system, as many issues seem to fall off of me like water rolling off a duck's back.  and i am writing this when i should be following up on a couple of closings and working on several reports actually say something--its not rolling off my back as it should. You guessed it, rant/story incoming!

Well me and my gf were out there gear-leveling our alts, me on my rogue and her on her DK.  I barely had enough ilevel to enter heroics, 329 to be exact, as does she and we qued for our second or third heroic on those toons last night (the first we ever did on the rogue/dk set was throne of the tides with no other that i can recall of.  so i am thinking this is our second heroic). 

We sit for 30 minutes in queue, waiting, patiently.  Actually i was trying to put together a computer fan, a box from ikea, a used USB cable, and make it into a cooling solution for my xbox.  We were all a little occupied doing various things.  Anyway, the queue pops and we get Deadmines.  Back in the days we used to abbreviate it VC, for Van Cleef.  but i am not sure if we're still using that term.  Maybe DM, or Dire Maul fell off the face of the earth and no one mentions that as DM.  DM.  Anyway, lots of tangents today. sorry.

We zoned in and i checked out the three puggees.  They were all from Sisters of Elune, tank had mainly tanking gear with some dps pieces (no no right there), healer had good gear but nothing fancy.  spec looked OK but with no pain suppression? whaaa?  oh and fury warrior was speced... fury, of course. 

In we go, after the first readycheck (omg really?) we pulled the first ogre and his kobold.  After the first pull i can tell we werent doing too well.  Me and my gf were at 7k dps. pretty decent for entry level heroics, i thought.  then i saw the warrior's dps at 3.2k.  oh noes.  But maybe he wasnt ready.  plus, no one died.  so off to the next pull and i jumped into the cannon. I shot everything up so the second pull, which included a whole bunch of kolbolds and an ogre was a farce.  the cannon did all the work and the dps could have just stood there.  that's fine.  the next pull were the two ogres before the first boss.  i couldnt sap so we pulled them together.  take fell to about 15% health twice but recovered.  healer went OOM.  warrior did 3.4k dps! an increase, yay!

Then our first boss fight occured. again, me and my gf were doing about 6-7k dps while running around in circles, avoiding the fire wall and the electro-zones.  actually i got caught in electro bomb zones several times because there was really no where else to go.  I had to help the tank pick up adds with Tricks/FoK, which really really helped centralize damage.  After about 20 seconds of fire wall, the warrior dies.  then the healer.  then the tank and everyone else.  the tank asks what went wrong.  no one replied.  actually it was pretty obvious. healer died so we all died.  duh, right?  the 3.2k dps warrior could have just been dead since the start and it wouldnt have mattered.

Second attempt went better.  Me and my gf both got the [Ready for Raiding] acheivement.  i think a chestpiece dropped for me, which i was pretty happy about since it replaced a level 312 chest.  we move on to trash.  death happened when we pulled the two casters which i expected was bound to happen.  but we rebounded because the second attempt had less mobs!  on one pull, the healer died to a monkey.  the tank died to the monkey too.  then i realized what was happening and i clicked on the ball and chain to make the monkey turn friendly.  after that, the tank made it an effort to make all the remaining monkeys friendly.

We get to the lumber room with the oaf/goblin and, of course, took two attempts.  the first attempt was a little dull.  Nothing out of the ordinary happened.  we would have survived if the oaf didnt pick the healer to slam into the wall.  besides that, the only real complaint i had was that no one picked up the goblin to attack. i guess it doesnt matter either way. but after the first wipe on him, the tank said hmmmm.  and i replied with, "healer died in that attempt, if oaf picked someone else to ram into the wall, we would have been okay."  the healer replied with "so blame the healer for everything".  well, i call it like i see it. its nothing personal. anyway, i replied with basically instructions on how to do this well.  "avoid the bombs, dps down the boss, switch to goblin when he jumps off, and if you're below 70% health when you get slammed in the wall, you die."   the tank replies with "so you know everything about this fight".  i took that as a snarky remark and said, "totally".  no reply. 

we went ahead and killed him this time.  again, me and my gf were tops in dps.  brand new heroic rats doing about 7k dps.  and again, warrior was at 3.2k dps.  tank was doing abotu 5k. healer was OOM.

We went on to wipe again.  On trash.  Once we got to the forge, it was it for me.  we were there for a little over an hour and anything bullshit that anyone gave me will have me reply with less than pleasant words.  We were at four wipes already, maybe more bc i could have lost count.  but at least four.  twice on boss and at least twice on trash. 

We proceeded down the circular ramp towards the first reaver.  The tank asked who wants to use the robot.  i asked if anyone knows how (much better question, dont you think?).  there was no reply. i asked my gf not to jump on the reaver, even though she has an idea of how to use it.  i knew how to use it too, but i wanted the warrior, who was doing crap ass dps to get on the reaver.  at least we'll maximize our potential that way.  after a couple of minutes of just standing around, the warrior got the hint and jumped on the reaver.  after we killed the enemy reaver, i would hop on to it to help out the fight before it self destructs.  what i found out was amazing. the warrior stood with the tank, thereby receiving the cleave damage.  by the time we got to the third reaver, the warrior's reaver bot died and he had to dps on foot.  he also used steam jets or whatever that ability was to knock me back several times.  i countered with a charge that stunned the enemy reaver.  easy enough.  after the last reaver died, the warrior got into his robot and the tank pulled Reaper. 

Now things were going quite smoothly for the first 30 seconds of the fight.  yes, it was bliss for that long.  stay out of harvest, stay out of overdrive.  easy.  we did that.  most of the fight was us running away with intervals of dps. this is how the fight should be.  then from behind i get a slag attacking me, then i died.  upon hitting my face with the keyboard, i saw several more slags moving up the ramp.  good job warrior.  We wipe, of course. 

As i was zoning into the instance again, for the sixth time, the tank posts the dps meters. then says, i dont think we have enough dps for this fight.  i was in disbelief that this guy could actually say that after we topped meters the entire fight.  and his warrior buddy was on a reaver, so his dps didnt quite count.  also, this is a heavy movement fight and dps is secondary to survival (a misnomer, since dps should ALWAYS be secondary to survival, but this fight exemplifies it).  in any case, i replied with, "this is a two-dps fight".  the tank replies with, "i know that but i dont think our dps is good enough".  no shit.  the dps cant dps with slags flowing in.  in any case, i replied with something like this, "you're right, i do think you guys need to learn to play better before you queue for heroics again. peace out. "

then i left.  my gf saw the rest of them leave so she left too.  no one replied to me.  no one could say much i guess. 

in any case, why is this a problem? and why is my blog post title about another game?  It is because the tank completely disregarded the fail of his teammates.  as if, it was completely forgotten.  of course, him and his friends could do no wrong and every little piece of failure that his team produced was lost to oblivion. 

i dont know what planet these guys were from, but from the "dont blame me" attitude of the healer, to the snarky comments from the tank, to the utter disregard of incompetence from these three people or the ridiculously low dps from the fury dps warrior (you know the class that usually tops meters with their whirlwind?), i could not imagine the only response from the tank was that maybe the dps wasnt good enough for this fight.

No, the dps did suck. but it didnt suck because the rogue or the dk was doing bad dps, or that our total combined 15k dps (5k split between three people). the dps sucked because the warrior sucked donkey nuts.  total was about 15k for all three dps.  but the tank was doing 3k.  we were doing 6k each. im sorry, but we can only carry so much fail.  after a while it becomes a matter of, Gevlon told you so.  and yes, im sitting there watching how M&S cannot figure out that maybe they are the problem and not the good players.  It's people like these that make us wish we could play with our guildies more.  at that time, it was 10pm PDT, or 1am EDT, so most of our guildies were sleeping.

Not once did i see a penance from the disc priest.  not once did i see a prayer of mending fly around.  very little will i see a PW:Shield come flying my way.  I never saw a power word barrier, never saw hymn of hope, never saw inner focus, never saw a renew. the healer's major heals were greater heal and power word shield. no archangel either, tho he was specc'd into it. 

The warrior was doing mainly auto-attacks (40% of damage) heroic strike and colossus smash. yep, that's it.  maybe rend every once in a while and a thunder clap.  but that's it. 

The tank, on single bosses, hammer of the righteous (crusaderstrike, no?), little judgments, and very few shield of the righteous.  add to that no inquisition.  i cannot comment on whether he did use divine protection or ardent defender.

but how can a bunch of fail players get together and pretend like they're good without seeing that other people are doing amazingly better than them. yes, amazingly better compared to how they play.  i mean if somoene was doing twice my damage, sometimes 3x my damage, wouldnt i want to know how he does it? maybe i can reproduce what he did next time around.  that's how i see it.  and how can i play a class and not take criticism? i mean the healer's response was basically, "yea blame the healer for everything."  What's even more striking was that the tank would often say, "thats my fault" when it really wasnt his fault.  it was the healer.  i could come up with my own theories of why that is, but let me keep my theories to myself for now. 

now i dont care if someone is bad as long as he is willing to listen to reason and learn from those who are doing better than him.  five wipes before we get halfway into the instance is NOT good.  and thinking that maybe its everyone else except for me is not "reason" or reasonable.  perhaps it is you especially if the dps arent being stupid.  maybe its you.  or maybe its one of you.  stop defending your failed friends.  protecting them will not make them better.  pretending that they are great players will only make them great players in their own world.  but in a world where people are playing with each other, there is a matter of truth that must be accepted by all.  you cant relegate all oberservations that's critical to you or your friends to oblivion.  thus, i will not relegate your actions to mere disregard.  i will regard your actions, your playstyle, your abilities and your replies to me.  i will not pretend you guys dont suck.  and i didnt.  please do the same to your friends.  you're only fooling yourselves and eventually, it will cause headaches for those unfortunate to party with you.  i should have put you on ignore when i had the chance.  too late now as i forgot all of their names.  i only know them as the idiots from Sisters of Elune.

to you, poor souls, i pity you.