Ahead of the curve is the worst thing blizzard invented

[purebalance]

Of course it should be a requirement. It proves that you have done the raid and completed it on that difficulty. It might not prove by 100% that you will do well, but it sorts away 99% of risky players.

No it doesn't considering you can easily be carried or buy a carry. If you're completely bad and join a group on Xavius simply because of the ilvl and do terrible dps and they still down him, you still get AotC. AotC proves NOTHING.

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That is your opinion. Why do police officers firstly ask you if you have a valid drivers license? To reduce time spent on screening you, and see whether you fulfill the law.

A raid leader with an ambition for his pug does the same. They want to reduce risk and increase their raid's success rate, and see if you fulfill their "law", whilst not spending half an hour playing a physiologist and finding out who you are.

And no, I don't touch pugs. Achievements and item level does not reduce risk down to an acceptable level. I would only touch Openraid organized raids.

Looking at your post count and your attitude towards this, I seriously can't believe that you have ever been more than a ZG/MC player in vanilla or Karazhan/ZA raider in TBC.

All I can say is that perhaps you should not raid anymore. You are more negative than positive about it, and you would rather whine about it on a forum than joining a guild that suits your needs. You're a troll and all you're getting from this thread, are more posts to your total

Terrible analogy. Having a driver's license is the law(and it isn't in some countries and they get along just fine) whereas having AotC is not. Having a driver's license proves you passed the test while having AotC proves you were simply present for a kill.

[Deleted]

So... I wanna be clear.

Ive done Xavius normal 3 times now, the "first" was on week one, in blue gear.

So whats the issue?

Im not a guild person and I dont have interest in joining one or time to invest in one, but id like to join a raid and im 857 more than over geared at this point for heroic.

I have deadly boss mods, check.

I have the gear give or take, check.

I have the flasks, the food, I have it all, check.

But I dont have "Ahead of the Curve"

Despite the fact I have the Rift of Aln achievement, the first week this raid launched, I dont have -Ahead- of the curve.

This, to me, is a reoccuring problem with raiding these days.

So you dont have Curve? Well good luck getting into raids.

Just fake the achievement, i dont remenber if its an addon or if its just a script you put in a macro. Its been around since wotlk.

[Jacob6875]

Just join a different group.

I've never linked an achievement for anything. Even when they ask for one in the description they rarely if ever ask me to actually link it.

[kneehidude]

I just love the pathological fear that people have that they might be at risk of "carrying" someone.

They'd rather run the entire instance and vendor all the drops because no one there actually needed anything than risk the black stain on their soul that taking someone who might actually need the gear would give them.

Well if people could actually pull decent numbers in the gear they have, then this wouldn't be an issue. But we have people that pull about half the dps, if even, that they possibly could with the gear they have on. It is possible to do a raid in less gear than what is available. But you can't suck, you have to be good. Unfortunately, to down a boss with gear like that, you pretty much need to be in a coordinated group, or pay for a carry.

[Deleted]

If someone who cleared Sunwell when it was relevant wanted into a group that I was forming, you can be darn sure that I'd entertain that. I mean, WoW isn't the kind of game that people get really "rusty" at in that sense. It doesn't have those same mechanical requirements that a FPS or FGC game would have, for example.

In the end, generally competence in WoW just revolves around "giving a damn" more than anything else.

Your groups must be horrible then.

Seriously, this is an old argument. As someone already said, when we start a pug we try to filter the bad apples out. Since we cant do a background check on everyone, AOTC and ilev are the best options out there. On average, a random 870 will do better dps than a random 855. And a random with AOTC is less likely to fail than a random without. It's always been like this, and people who dont get it just suck at statistics.

And of course no one ever said that everyone with AOTC will never fail, and that everyone without will always fail. Point is, if you want to pug xavius hc and make a group of 20 with AOTC and another 20 without AOTC, the first one will have better results id say 99% of the times.

Personally I'm 4/7M atm and I only did a full hc pug once on my alt this tier... took a bit to find people because i asked aotc, ilev and even the best hfc mythic progression with old date... that said we one shotted every boss, took 4 tries at cenarius and 3 at xav. Pretty sure would've been a total disaster if i just went wirh randoms without checkin any hfc/aotc/ilev.

If people dont like being asked for AOTC they can start a group themselves. They will stop whining about AOTC once they do so and invite random people and then fail at first boss and have half group leave, which is what happens in 99% of the real pugs made without strict requirements.
The problem is that people whining for AOTC are usually the ones that want to be carried. There are a lot of progression raids for people without AOTC, but they dont join those raids, they want to join a one shot (or almost one shot) group with everyone experienced.

[snackfeat]

Make your own group.

[Volitar]

I'll never get this mentality. So you're being "Carried" if you do content with someone who has already done it? Regardless of anything else?

I mean kind of. If you weren't there for any progression or wipes you just get cakewalked into the kill by 19 people who have already done it then yes.

[Jaldor01]

Easy solution - Start your own group and wipe for ages with none curve people. People with curve don't want to wipe every hour on a boss they have already cleared previously. No point complaining just because you haven't put the effort in to get the achievement yet.

[Deleted]

You are carried, pretty much, if you do worse than the average of what is needed for a kill, because that means that to get the kill someone else has to do a lot more (carry you...) to make up for what you are lacking. Obviously someone who doesnt have AOTC but is very high on dps isnt being carried. Point is, this doesnt happen often at all... because dps (and healing and dealing with mechanics) is better with more experience, and on average someone with AOTC (once again) has more experience than someone without.

[Makorus]

So if you come in and don't screw up and do better than average DPS, it's a "carry" just because other people have the achievement?

No, it's not.

But how would group leaders know that you aren't there to get carried? You act like group leaders get some kind of CV containing all your strengths and weaknesses and how much DPS you do and how well you would do the mechanics etc.

But that's not the case. And to reduce the risk of getting shitters without putting a shit ton of effort into it by going through WClogs etc., you just dont take people who don't have AOTC. It's not a difficult concept.

[stomination]

People would still be able to check to see if you had killed xavius in heroic without needing an achievement. Its not hard to armory ppl.

[Deadite]

I won't waste my evening on some stranger who can't carry his own weight. Raiding is not a charity. You have LFR for that.

The irony being that LFR is the difficulty level you are hoping to achieve.

[Ebalina]

I just love the pathological fear that people have that they might be at risk of "carrying" someone.

They'd rather run the entire instance and vendor all the drops because no one there actually needed anything than risk the black stain on their soul that taking someone who might actually need the gear would give them.

No one likes to carry people around in any sphere of their lives why should wow be an exception ?

[Deleted]

So whats the issue?

bring the achievement, not the player. if blizzard was able, they wouldve delivered a better system. Not just apply with no other information then spec and itemlevel..

[Kazuchika]

If people like OP put half the effort into finding a half decent guild as they do making these threads maybe they'd actually progress in a meaningful way.

"I'm not a guild person"

Well when you decide to be antisocial in a game based around working together with other people you're probably playing the wrong game then.

[Veshx]

i did a full heroic clear of EN in a pug, week one, well my guild was only able to down 1 boss

so i dont see the problem here
cept my guild really needs to pull their shit together

Everything this person said, minus the guild part because that's none of my business.


The 2nd/3rd week of EN being open there were so many groups in the group finder pugging Heroic Xavius not asking for AoTC.

[Glorious Leader]

No one likes to carry people around in any sphere of their lives why should wow be an exception ?

Because while its potentially appropriate for individuals to seek maximum gains if every individual does this it becomes a problem. Yes you all want to make sure you have the best runs you possible can so you filter people out. People who then leave raiding or the game in general. This of course has severe coneequences at the aggregate. Once you start thinking about the bigger picture and less about my group and only my group (or worse my success and only my success) you start to see why its a problem. Especially in a game where you need people.


Im curious if anyone can think of a way to flip this equation. Instead of having groups that are really picky and choosy have groups and leaders who are desperate and clamoring for people. A sellers market not a buyers one?

[Gaidax]

Ahead of the Curve is just an achievement, if it would not exist then it would be something else - other achievement, ilvl, gearscore, whatever.

Point is simple, a group leader's main task is to increase success chance by gathering people most suitable for the challenge, not to run some boosting charity. Sounds bad? Not really. For me it sounds as taking care about the guys already in the group who want as smooth and painless run as possible and inviting people who at least once done content is a sensible thing to do at the least.

[Lord Pebbleton]

I got my AotC after joining a heroic Cenarius group that had the requisited for Xavius, without ever clearing Elerethe or Il'gynoth on heroic.
You just have to find a Cenarius group and do your best, then suggest moving on to Xavius.

[Reick]

From my experience, before i got the "AOTC", most of the time, i speak with the raid leader and try to show him how serious i am. I have that many Ilvl, i deal x dps, i know my shit, just kick me if i fail or fall behind.
And it actually work, most of the time, for me. Now, since i got the achievement, it's open bar for the most elistist group and i clean nm and hm every week in less than 2 hours !

Most PuG raid leader want to clean the encounter and are not jerks by nature, show them you are serious and don't fuck up after and you'll push further into the raid.