My First Instance Experience and relying on team mates.

[magomago]

Hi everyone. I just did my first instance today and want to give my opinion on it.

Actually, in the span of two hours I did it twice. It was the Van Cleef Instance.

I was looking to get 5 Hops and was looking for Hops when I noticed someone scream "VC looking for healer!" And though that HMMM I remember someone told me that you should be level 20 to do it, or a BASE of level 18 (because a level 12 was asking to party with people to do the instance and people told him he was too early)

Anyways I messaged him and he said "You are perfect" although I wondered if I was a little low.

The party I was with consisted of a 20 Warrior (who was the "leader"), A 19 druid, A 20 Palladin and a 20 Rogue. The warrior definitely sounded like he knew what he was doing telling us to organize and everything and I never had much of a problem because I like that. Had he not taken the lead I probably would tried to. but the Palladin, Druid and Rogue were kinda wacko. The Palladin kept saying he'd tank, but I tried explaining that while he was versitile...the warrior is best to tank. But he kept insisting he would do it as well but we told him not to. The rogue had a problem of always trying to stealth..that was kind of annoying but not that bad. And then the DRUID.. OMFG talk about a wannabe! He insisted on tanking and kept trying to draw aggro off the warrior, after we got pissed at him for that he decided to play a healer because "I'm a level 18 noob priest, not a level 20 real preist. HE can do just under 400 heal so I should sit back and shut up!". In fact what made me dissapointed was we were healing the same targets and it was SUCH as waste of mana... He was REALLLY annoying. While the other people always passed on cloth (one even gave me cloth when he accidently took it) since they know I use that, this guy would NEVER pass on it and insist on taking anything of value. He also wouldn't give up a gun and an axe to our warrior who needed them and the warrior accused him (and I agreed) that he just wanted to sell it for cash. why? Because he picked up a NICE healing staff and people told him to give it up to me but he said no because he wanted it. But the funny part is he didn't want to equip it because "he didn't want it to take damage...save it for later since he didn't want to repair it" and that screams "I wanna sell it because I don't want to spend money to repair". about 1/2 way through the instance he started going and attacking his own people and it was always a "don't worry guys I know what i'm doing" or "I got things under control". He even told me to go back and I was like "no I need to see the tank so I can heal him, gotta stay in line of sight" and he told me "LISTEN you don't have to CLICK ON US TO HEAL US, just click on our pictures in the corner of your screen" and everyone went "=_=|||" but I guess he never cared. So going down the spiral case to the big furnace where the globins are the warrior said "hol on guys let go back and make sure the patrol isn't coming" and the other guy said "no they aren't there trust me" and the warrior was getting mad because he wouldn't wait (he never does, he always goes to "scout") so he dashes foreward anyways and the warrior said "GUYS the patrol is coming!" too late though wonderful night elf duird has already aggroed like 5 of them and saying"need some backup". So we get flanked from two sides...and it isn't pretty. Espceially hard on me because I have to heal the tank since I don't want him to die . But no matter what direction I go there are enemies, and I've done things like fade and put a powerward to be safe. But I get killed in the midst of battle and the others barely make it and then he goes "I'LL HEAL YOU" and the warrir is screaming "no let the paladin do it you have only once every 30 min!" but luckily the paladin was smart enough to just run over and heal before the idiot had a chance. And we were not chastising him through chat, any "issues" we had we discussed among ourselves...even the accusation later that occured was when we died. But when I came back to life he told me "WTF You suck dude! Pay Attention and get out of the way, Geez we don't have room for laggards" even though he was the last person I healed before I died. So then the Paladin had to pull, leaving 4 people to do VC. So we kept going slowly and we hit the entryway to the ship and the fool saw a treasure chest and screamed "YEAH A CHEST ITS MINE" and the warrior screamed "don't!!!!" but he didnt' listen. So while we hadn't killed all the guys he spawned some big ass black bull or something and was like "shitt come help me guys" and i'm like "=_="

We got up and then he went into tank mode and started and ran and attacked EVERYTHING. We didn't last a minute after it, or atlesat me and the warrior. We died and the rogue and the druid barely survived and went "See i'm the good player" when he was the one that spawned so many enemies and the warrior spent more time trying to get aggro under control and away from me so I could heal.


But seriously....I've never met such as assy player. I've partied withs ome bad people but its not that bad. It makes perfect sense how ONE BAD PLAYER IN AN INSTANCE CAN RUIN IT ALL. I was really depressed, we had spent almost an hour doing it, especially since the paladin left it was more difficult.

So then I got out and another group spotted me (i was almost elvel 19...had about 1/2 bar left) and flagged me. I guess being a preist just makes it easy since you are in demand. But it was a group of 6 raning level 22-24 with a mage (hevel 19) and paladins, warriors and rogues...the group was UPBEAT AND POSITIVE, told me not to be worried by my low level and the bad instance. Though they were not structed and organized like the warrior from my last one. When asked who would tank they replied "all of us but the mage" They kept talking and giving encouragement and I really liked it. We blasted through the thing in about 20 minutes with the philosophy "keep moving cause we don't want them to respawn and bite us in the A$$". Things like the mage stopping me about 1/3 of the way to give me 60 waters was nice, and the guys ALWAYS keeping aggro off of me. In return they all stayed alive mostly(till the end when i got slayed but more on that) and it was just a bunch of good fun. Me PW:S mage, Mage run into group of enemies and cast a spell and whack them all. We got to the end and just before VC we all regrouped and rested and made a plan of attack. We excuted it fine but ath the end I couldn't get aggro off me, even when i faded and stopped spelling casting and running so I died and caused the main tank to die but it was okay and they said thanks a LOT because he didn't expect to last that long (he would have lived, but I don't know why they attacking the enemies, me fading and standing still for 10 seconds near the warrior so they don't have to run after the enemy causes them to keep attacking me...)

So the type of group SERIOUSLY make a difference...even if someone was just a bit of an ass I can see how that totally messes up everything. I think next time I'm defintely going to start being selective about the groups, especially since I have leverage as a preist

But seriously...I know how you guys feel and I'm srupseid that there can be peopel that act like this, espceially when a lot of us want GOOD players to paly with...yo'ud think it only makes sense!

Cliff Notes:

1) Sucks when a party member doesn't play, he messed me up bad
2) When a party played right it was heaven
3) everyone should get long attention spans

 

[Kasper4christ]

1) long post
2) people are going to want Cliffs
3) when you heal, you also gain agro proportional to the ammnt you heal
4) spell check?
5) profit?

 

[DaveSimmons]

Interesting reading.

I'm tempted to start playing WoW, but your story is both persuasion (second run) and dissuasion (first run). Unless you can find a group of people to play with regularly it does seem a complete roll of the dice for good vs. bad experiences.

 

[Sunner]

Punctuation and paragraphs are your friends.
Still read it though, and I agree completely, a single crappy member can ruin an instance.
Luckily for me, I've found a bunch of people that I tend to do 75+% of my instance runs with, and while we do get wiped once in a while it's all good fun, because it's generally due to taking on enemies we have little chance of beating, and once in a while due to a bad pull or stuff like that.

 

[magomago]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
Interesting reading.

I'm tempted to start playing WoW, but your story is both persuasion (second run) and dissuasion (first run). Unless you can find a group of people to play with regularly it does seem a complete roll of the dice for good vs. bad experiences.

For sure I'll agree on this. I t hink its easy to gauge in the first few minutes. I tried the instance for the third time and got a group together and felt a little bad when a guy was insisting on brining a level 11 mage. Sure enough everyone was running left and right and NOWHERE near eachother and then within 5 minutes of enetering a HUGE mob came in and killed us all. And one of the guys was "WOW didn't expect that" and I promptly left the party
I think like all things it is a hit and miss, and I kind of like that because it is more realisitc. Not all your parties will be like that. While fighting in red ridge a nice couple of elves came in and gave me some support to finish a quest much faster which I found enjoyable. Some guy in the north map was screaming about somethign and I went and helped him and he appreciated it. I really think that in a MMORPG the concept of "pay it foreward" works excellently...

Besides, the people that don't play or know what they are doing don't find it very enjoyable. Point in case: with the random "mob" of people htat just rushed in I found a few of the players sitting there for like 20 minutes asking to join random instances...it shows those who understand how to play because if you find enjoyment you won't have to do something like that...and the more you play and "altruistic" you are your name will get out anyways.


Oh and I could have written a LOT more about the "smooth" instance I had, but it was sooo smooth I don't see the point...its kind of like how people can write hour news reports on bad stuff easily, but the good stuff of the entire done is done in 5 minutes


Cliff Notes:

1) Be a good boy and game will be fun anyways
2) Learn to gauge within a few minutes of how the party will work. Just b/c its chaos doesn't mean it isn't organized chaos (my second run)
3)Get longer attention spans so you don't have to read cliff notes

 

[fishbits]

OK, so in the first group everyone wanted to tank and that was a bad thing, and in the second group everyone wanted to tank, which was a good thing. The second group's +3 avg in levels surely helped add to it seeming easier as well. It does seem the latter were much better though.

Deadmines are (or should be) a real eye-opener for most, far more demanding than what's come before. Still, it's far easier when following simple guidelines: Stay together, manage aggro, cover each other's weaknesses. Now you can still fail when following these, but you can't succeed without it. It staggered me to see not only how many couldn't do basic grouping tactics, but wouldn't pick them up no matter how many times the same bad choice resulted in problems.

Tip to make grouping easier: Watch a player you're thinking of inviting. If he jumps more than 3 times in 5 seconds, it's not going to be worth it. And loot squabbling is always ALWAYS a no-no. If I'm a tailor and the other guy gets cloth off his corpse, no problem. It was his turn. Now if folks want to establish a pattern of distributing things to folks based on class/profession then that's preferable, but if they don't seem to adhere to it, take what you get and be happy for it. Roll for green+ items/chests. But if loot squabbling is about to start, stop everything right there until it's settled. If it can't be settled, I'm out. It'll only get worse from that point on.

 

[Sunner]

Originally posted by: fishbits
OK, so in the first group everyone wanted to tank and that was a bad thing, and in the second group everyone wanted to tank, which was a good thing. The second group's +3 avg in levels surely helped add to it seeming easier as well. It does seem the latter were much better though.

Deadmines are (or should be) a real eye-opener for most, far more demanding than what's come before. Still, it's far easier when following simple guidelines: Stay together, manage aggro, cover each other's weaknesses. Now you can still fail when following these, but you can't succeed without it. It staggered me to see not only how many couldn't do basic grouping tactics, but wouldn't pick them up no matter how many times the same bad choice resulted in problems.

Tip to make grouping easier: Watch a player you're thinking of inviting. If he jumps more than 3 times in 5 seconds, it's not going to be worth it. And loot squabbling is always ALWAYS a no-no. If I'm a tailor and the other guy gets cloth off his corpse, no problem. It was his turn. Now if folks want to establish a pattern of distributing things to folks based on class/profession then that's preferable, but if they don't seem to adhere to it, take what you get and be happy for it. Roll for green+ items/chests. But if loot squabbling is about to start, stop everything right there until it's settled. If it can't be settled, I'm out. It'll only get worse from that point on.

Hey, I always jump up and down when I'm restless, and I'm supposedly a very good tank
Kinda like when I'm trying to think of something sitting with bash in front of me, I'll continually type "ls -l" for no reason whatsoever

 

[fishbits]

Nothing personal, I just play the odds.

 

[Argo]

I've had a lot of cases like that. Just had one the other day where me and 2 of my guildes teamed up with a priest and warlock to do Uldaman. The whole instance sucked, the priest thought she was a mage and would just blast damage spells at the mobs, without healing anybody except herself. The warlock thought he was a tank and kept pulling mobs. We had to disband the group, it was that annoying.

Then the next day I grouped with 4 random people to do the same instace (warrior, druid, 2 hunters and me, a mage) and we did the whole instance in less than 2 hours. Everybody really knew what they were doing and all loot was distributed to appropriate people without having to say anything.

My advice is, if withing the first 5 minutes you notice somethign wrong with your group leave asap. Otherwise you'll just end up wasting a couple of hours and probalby won't even complete any quests.

 

[Noema]

I love running instances. It's by far my favourite part of the game. I like the tension involved and how everyone has to concentrate to do their job right.

I do think, however, that the 'looking for group' system in WoW leaves a lot to be desired: The meetings stones don't work and the LFG channel is only useful in capitals, so that means you have to go to Orgrimmar or Ironforge, spam the channel, find your group, wait until everybody gets ready and then fly to the instance, which can take sometimes 20 or more minutes.

It would be nice if there were an option to 'flag' yourself as 'looking for group' for certain instances, so one could type '/who LFG Scarlet Monastery priest' and get a list of all the priests that are looking to do a SM run.

I heard they are adding some features to the meetng stones in order for them to be accesible through inn keepers. That sounds like a step in the right direction.

 

[Noema]

Originally posted by: Argo
I've had a lot of cases like that. Just had one the other day where me and 2 of my guildes teamed up with a priest and warlock to do Uldaman. The whole instance sucked, the priest thought she was a mage and would just blast damage spells at the mobs, without healing anybody except herself. The warlock thought he was a tank and kept pulling mobs. We had to disband the group, it was that annoying.

I am just baffled by the fact that some priests can go for 40+ levels without realizing they are healers, and that that's the only role they should play in instances.

 

[Quixfire]

Originally posted by: Argo
I've had a lot of cases like that. Just had one the other day where me and 2 of my guildes teamed up with a priest and warlock to do Uldaman. The whole instance sucked, the priest thought she was a mage and would just blast damage spells at the mobs, without healing anybody except herself. The warlock thought he was a tank and kept pulling mobs. We had to disband the group, it was that annoying.

Then the next day I grouped with 4 random people to do the same instace (warrior, druid, 2 hunters and me, a mage) and we did the whole instance in less than 2 hours. Everybody really knew what they were doing and all loot was distributed to appropriate people without having to say anything.

My advice is, if withing the first 5 minutes you notice somethign wrong with your group leave asap. Otherwise you'll just end up wasting a couple of hours and probalby won't even complete any quests.

I heard the warrior you grouped with was a total ego manic and ran around killing everything insite, managing argo, and made sure everyone was getting their needed quest items. :Q

How is your guild with helping other members with quests or tradeskills?

 

[Quixfire]

Originally posted by: Noema

Originally posted by: Argo
I've had a lot of cases like that. Just had one the other day where me and 2 of my guildes teamed up with a priest and warlock to do Uldaman. The whole instance sucked, the priest thought she was a mage and would just blast damage spells at the mobs, without healing anybody except herself. The warlock thought he was a tank and kept pulling mobs. We had to disband the group, it was that annoying.

I am just baffled by the fact that some priests can go for 40+ levels without realizing they are healers, and that that's the only role they should play in instances.

What suprises me is warrior who choose 2H or DW and insistes they can still be an effective tank. Then they complain that the healer isn't doing a good enough job.

 

[Superself]

Join a good guild and you shouldn't have this problem.

Us Warriors have a very tough job as it is. ALL HEALERS need to constantly watch the warrior's health and be ready to replenish it. I hate most Pally players who won't heal and want to just tank and be a badass.

 

[magomago]

Originally posted by: Noema

I am just baffled by the fact that some priests can go for 40+ levels without realizing they are healers, and that that's the only role they should play in instances.

Although I haven't seen this yet (and was complimented for being a good presit when I teamed up with a 17 Pally to do some quests) I REALLY find it hard that presists don't heal. Preists when it comes to partying should be healbots, and this is imperative in an instance. Maybe not as much just regular questing, but the ONLY attack in an instance you should be doing is using your wand.

But the intersting thing is almost EVERY preist I come along told me to not spec for holy What i'm doing right now is goingt o be holy, but I need some useful shadow talents so I'm looking to do about 10disc 30 holy and 10 shadow till I hit the 50s or so if that happens, and then totally respec to holy (with some disc, stuff like improved PWS is good)...but every single presit I have talked to told me screw holy and go shadow because they are unbeatable

 

[Argo]

Originally posted by: Quixfire

Originally posted by: Argo
I've had a lot of cases like that. Just had one the other day where me and 2 of my guildes teamed up with a priest and warlock to do Uldaman. The whole instance sucked, the priest thought she was a mage and would just blast damage spells at the mobs, without healing anybody except herself. The warlock thought he was a tank and kept pulling mobs. We had to disband the group, it was that annoying.

Then the next day I grouped with 4 random people to do the same instace (warrior, druid, 2 hunters and me, a mage) and we did the whole instance in less than 2 hours. Everybody really knew what they were doing and all loot was distributed to appropriate people without having to say anything.

My advice is, if withing the first 5 minutes you notice somethign wrong with your group leave asap. Otherwise you'll just end up wasting a couple of hours and probalby won't even complete any quests.

I heard the warrior you grouped with was a total ego manic and ran around killing everything insite, managing argo, and made sure everyone was getting their needed quest items. :Q

How is your guild with helping other members with quests or tradeskills?

My guild is horrible. Can't even help me finish Uldaman. As for our highest level tank, well don't get me started on him.

 

[DaveNinja]

my alt is a level 24 dwarf priest. I'm going totally for shadow because i dont have the chance to party up a lot of the time because i only play for short periods. With shadow i can solo and eventually just spend the gold and respec.

 

[jer0608]

I have a level 31 priest, with the exception of 3 points in Spirit Tap, every point I've gotten has gone into the Holy tree. I solo most of the time, doesn't give me much trouble. Maybe at higher levels, Holy priests get worse at soloing?

Not condoning the "killer priest" behavior, but keep in mind that solo and group play styles are perhaps more different for a priest than any other character, as you simply don't deal damage in a group. I sometimes have to acclimate to being in a group after soloing for awhile.

Originally posted by: Argo

My guild is horrible. Can't even help me finish Uldaman. As for our highest level tank, we'll don't get me started on him.

QFT. Not to mention this one level 45 mage...

 

[Quixfire]

Originally posted by: Argo

Originally posted by: Quixfire

Originally posted by: Argo
I've had a lot of cases like that. Just had one the other day where me and 2 of my guildes teamed up with a priest and warlock to do Uldaman. The whole instance sucked, the priest thought she was a mage and would just blast damage spells at the mobs, without healing anybody except herself. The warlock thought he was a tank and kept pulling mobs. We had to disband the group, it was that annoying.

Then the next day I grouped with 4 random people to do the same instace (warrior, druid, 2 hunters and me, a mage) and we did the whole instance in less than 2 hours. Everybody really knew what they were doing and all loot was distributed to appropriate people without having to say anything.

My advice is, if withing the first 5 minutes you notice somethign wrong with your group leave asap. Otherwise you'll just end up wasting a couple of hours and probalby won't even complete any quests.

I heard the warrior you grouped with was a total ego manic and ran around killing everything insite, managing argo, and made sure everyone was getting their needed quest items. :Q

How is your guild with helping other members with quests or tradeskills?

My guild is horrible. Can't even help me finish Uldaman. As for our highest level tank, well don't get me started on him.

I found this post on your guild's website. I believe it was made by your high level warrior.

Bloodrunner, Jevonkearse, Mazonas, Wern, & myself did all the pre-instance quests last night. Jevon could only stay an hour and didn't have any of the quests so I'm expecting he will want to do them later.

After a quick run to IF we returned to Uldaman and added Sassy to our group. We went through the whole instance and complete all the quests. I picked up a better helm and 2H weapon as drops and got a better necklace as a quest reward.

I had a lot of fun and was well worth staying up until 2:00 am to complete the instance. Please let me know if anyone else needs to do the quests in or out of Uldaman and I'll be happy to join you.

Sounds like he just doesn't like you.

 

[torpid]

Originally posted by: magomago

Originally posted by: Noema

I am just baffled by the fact that some priests can go for 40+ levels without realizing they are healers, and that that's the only role they should play in instances.

Although I haven't seen this yet (and was complimented for being a good presit when I teamed up with a 17 Pally to do some quests) I REALLY find it hard that presists don't heal. Preists when it comes to partying should be healbots, and this is imperative in an instance. Maybe not as much just regular questing, but the ONLY attack in an instance you should be doing is using your wand.

But the intersting thing is almost EVERY preist I come along told me to not spec for holy What i'm doing right now is goingt o be holy, but I need some useful shadow talents so I'm looking to do about 10disc 30 holy and 10 shadow till I hit the 50s or so if that happens, and then totally respec to holy (with some disc, stuff like improved PWS is good)...but every single presit I have talked to told me screw holy and go shadow because they are unbeatable

Just stick with 5 shadow in that case, all in spirit tap. It's indispensible for people who solo a lot. Also, I personally find that the disc tree is excellent. At the least you should try to pick up improved shield and improved PWF. A lot of the holy talents are a bit weak for the amount of points you put into them.

 

[cKGunslinger]

I've had some good and not-so-good Instance groups. Our guild is very good, but I dont' play as often as some, so they've out-leveled me and my wife a bit and are hard to grab for lower-level dungeons (I'm a 48 dwarf hunter.)

I have one more quest in Uldaman before I'm finished there, and about 5-6 for Mauradon. The last 3-4 runs through Uldaman with pick-up groups have been disastarous. We've never had a full group and have had to rely on Druids as our main healers. I'm a hunter (so is 35% of the rest of our server), and I have my role down pretty pat. Most other hunters seem to be very confused. No trap setting, or setting of fire/explosion traps on-top-of or right in-front-of my CC ice trap. No pet tanking and shooting from a distance (they all want to melee for some stupid reason.) No pulling aggro from healers if need be. No sacrificing for the good of the group (staying alive though a wipe is not something to be proud of, it means you probably didn't do your job, dumbass) No pet control (Don't let him chase that fleeing mob! Don't jump down and let him run the long way around, mob-train in tow! Stop begging for a pet heal while you are feigned!)

I also don't understand why not everyone has first aid? It can be invaluable, especially for a hunter with FD.

I still enjoy the game, however. I just tend to run around with my wife to play, picking up people along the way for certain quests if need be.

 

[Concillian]

groups are like a box of chocolates....

You never know if that warrior jumping up and down with that 2H sword is going to bust out with the 1H+shield and stick mobs to him like flies on stink (It's happened). and you never know if that level 45 warrior with a 1H + shield is going to use battle stance and never sunder, and be about as usful to the group as a level 35 priest who can't heal.

It's doubly true for Deadmines. The two boss fights in Deadmines (Smite and VC) are probably the most tactical until scarlet monastery (level 40-ish). I like playing Horde, but wish horde had Deadmines + Stockades instead of Ragefire Chasm + Wailing Caverns + Razorfen Kraul thos instances have nowhere near the story, ambiance and challenge of Deadmines and Stockades. If you have a group that's not overleveled, they better know how to deal with aggro. And if you have a level 18-19 you have to be SUPER careful on the ship. About level 20, the ship gets real easy, but an over-eager level 18 can ruin EVERYTHING.

I feel the first instance is a huge eye opener because there is literally ZERO training on aggro in the game. Personally I feel there should be a set of class-specific quests that must be soloed and have realistic group situations. For example, a warrior would have a quest to protect a healer and AoE mage and be presented with two and three mob situations where he has to hold aggro off them adequately to survive. Or a rogue quest where you go up against mobs that hit HARD and there is an NPC warrior type and healer type and if you pull aggro too much the healer will run out of mana and if you don't do enough damage the healer will run out of mana. Something that gives you a taste for how aggro works without having to be in a group. Something that teaches your class role in a group situation. A single, instanced, highly scripted quest that goes through the basics and gives an item that does not have equal at your level so people want to do the quest, or even something that would be a requirement for entering 5 man instances... Better yet would be two. One with moderate difficulty for ~level 20 when you're going into your first instance, and one for ~level 40 when the instances start changing from only boss pulls are tough to sitautions where almost every pull is like a lower level instance boss pull.

 

[Schadenfroh]

shorter version of how groups go in wow

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=33&threadid=1577754&enterthread=y

 

[magomago]

Originally posted by: torpid

Originally posted by: magomago

Originally posted by: Noema

I am just baffled by the fact that some priests can go for 40+ levels without realizing they are healers, and that that's the only role they should play in instances.

Although I haven't seen this yet (and was complimented for being a good presit when I teamed up with a 17 Pally to do some quests) I REALLY find it hard that presists don't heal. Preists when it comes to partying should be healbots, and this is imperative in an instance. Maybe not as much just regular questing, but the ONLY attack in an instance you should be doing is using your wand.

But the intersting thing is almost EVERY preist I come along told me to not spec for holy What i'm doing right now is goingt o be holy, but I need some useful shadow talents so I'm looking to do about 10disc 30 holy and 10 shadow till I hit the 50s or so if that happens, and then totally respec to holy (with some disc, stuff like improved PWS is good)...but every single presit I have talked to told me screw holy and go shadow because they are unbeatable

Just stick with 5 shadow in that case, all in spirit tap. It's indispensible for people who solo a lot. Also, I personally find that the disc tree is excellent. At the least you should try to pick up improved shield and improved PWF. A lot of the holy talents are a bit weak for the amount of points you put into them.

Oooh nice advice!!! I have 3 so far in spirit tap an dI guess I'll max out at 5.

Originally posted by: Concillian
groups are like a box of chocolates....

You never know if that warrior jumping up and down with that 2H sword is going to bust out with the 1H+shield and stick mobs to him like flies on stink (It's happened). and you never know if that level 45 warrior with a 1H + shield is going to use battle stance and never sunder, and be about as usful to the group as a level 35 priest who can't heal.

It's doubly true for Deadmines. The two boss fights in Deadmines (Smite and VC) are probably the most tactical until scarlet monastery (level 40-ish). I like playing Horde, but wish horde had Deadmines + Stockades instead of Ragefire Chasm + Wailing Caverns + Razorfen Kraul thos instances have nowhere near the story, ambiance and challenge of Deadmines and Stockades. If you have a group that's not overleveled, they better know how to deal with aggro. And if you have a level 18-19 you have to be SUPER careful on the ship. About level 20, the ship gets real easy, but an over-eager level 18 can ruin EVERYTHING.

I feel the first instance is a huge eye opener because there is literally ZERO training on aggro in the game. Personally I feel there should be a set of class-specific quests that must be soloed and have realistic group situations. For example, a warrior would have a quest to protect a healer and AoE mage and be presented with two and three mob situations where he has to hold aggro off them adequately to survive. Or a rogue quest where you go up against mobs that hit HARD and there is an NPC warrior type and healer type and if you pull aggro too much the healer will run out of mana and if you don't do enough damage the healer will run out of mana. Something that gives you a taste for how aggro works without having to be in a group. Something that teaches your class role in a group situation. A single, instanced, highly scripted quest that goes through the basics and gives an item that does not have equal at your level so people want to do the quest, or even something that would be a requirement for entering 5 man instances... Better yet would be two. One with moderate difficulty for ~level 20 when you're going into your first instance, and one for ~level 40 when the instances start changing from only boss pulls are tough to sitautions where almost every pull is like a lower level instance boss pull.

WOW...that is actually a VERY good idea. Another nice one would be for a healer where you have to learn to heal enough to where you don't run out of mana, and you don't let the person who you are healing die while also having to make sure that you don't draw too much aggro.

But i'll admit one thing: I didn't learn what aggro was until about level 13 or 14 when I was complaining to some people that the enemies always ran after me...

Furthermore, is there a spell for warriors or pallies or whoever called "pull aggro" or what? OR is it just their spells have higher rates of aggro ddealing? Because I was quseting with a 18 paladin earlier today and i swear enemies ALWAYS ran towards me instead of him...and he'd be smashing the enemies for like 8 seconds before being able to pull it off me~ but i've played with 16 and 17 paladins where I never think twice about the aggro. I ask this because i've only played as a preist: i haven't tried another class yes

 

[Argo]

Agro usually goes to whoever deals the most damage (or healing). Warriors have taunt to pull agro, pallys don't have anything AFAIK. That's why pallys who think they can be effective tanks in high level instances are sadly mistaken. I'm not sure how exactly agro works with healers, but with dps classes it's usually a good idea to let the tank build up agro for 10-15 seconds before you start attacking.