How do you cope with LFR's many negatives?

[deadman1]

I don't do LFR that's how.

[Deleted]

Although LFR has undeniably become the soul catch-up and endgame mechanism for the entirety of MoP's lifespan (sadly), the answer is quite simple:
I don't do LFR.

[Schwert]

I don't even touch it.
Even on my alts - I'd rather wait for a friends group to allow my undergeared alt in. Usually they just ask me to swap to my main at the worst on fights my alt doesn't need gear from.

I'd rather not raid at all in a week when I can't find a pug flex with a leader with an IQ over potato than touch LFR anymore.

[Redpanda]

set your expectations low. thats how I cope :P

[thedingleberry]

The reason most people leave mid-raid is because they were put into a group that already had bosses down before, and they were just catching the missed bosses. It's a problem that is getting worse, and the only way to get rid of it would be to tell people how many bosses are down in a group when the queue pops and allow them to pass on the spot and continue to wait for a fresh group. You can thank bliz for taking that away.

[mysticx]

How i cope? i shrug, do my best and keep going, any time spent wondering/raging at bad people in LfR (Not as common as you'd think anyway) is utterly wasted.

[Demindar]

I just continue on carrying them. Gotta get my VP somehow, right?

[Volitar]

cowards who leave without logical reason,

Ever think people leave because they got shit to do or don't need any more bosses?

Personally I hardly ever do run LFR and when I do I just mind my own business and don't talk to anyone. Just keep spamming Chainheal and never stop.

[shamanele]

i just que with people i know arent incompetent and we tend to push the group forward.

[Deleted]

I don't dare to venture into this maw of hell.
My main is 570 and doesn't need to. My warlock alt is 504 and... well, serves as a gold storage cos i'm over the cap.

Gonna gear him up to speed once WoD comes out anyway.

[Deleted]

i just hope that in WoD it wont be a must to do LFRs for legendarys...

[Rosstafa]

I try to avoid LFR now, only reason I've been doing it this patch is to catch up an alt on the legendary questline and just popping in to get the odd bit of gear. I would just do flex instead, but it falls on a bad night for me in our guild.

[judgementofantonidas]

I vote kick the people acting like a$$holes. A good trick is to wait until just before the last boss and kick them at the end. Helps that I'm a tank so we can just go with 4 or wait the 15 seconds for another dps.

I vote kick window lickers.

[draykorinee]

Looks like Blizzard are going to look at LFR's place in Wow with the next tier, hopefully dumb it down even more but reduce the gear even more, if they can make dungeons the defacto gearing route and not LFR again I'd be happy, I would say the dependency on LFR this expansion has been the biggest let down.

[Halyon]

I avoid doing LFR. There is no salvation if you jump in that particular shark pit.

[MrExcelion]

Like others have said you can turn off the chat channel or just not pay attention to it

[Eats Compost]

I stopped doing LFR. Flex stripped away any reason for me to do it; I don't have to do either if I already have gear, and if I need welfare pieces because normals aren't dropping something, then I can do flex.

I find LFR to easily be the single least fun thing in the game right now. It has all of the worst extremes of content. It has no challenge, and yet has a reliance on 24 could-be-idiots can wipe you quite frequently. It has a loot lottery that can be quite frustrating at times, yet doesn't even award gear that's good for anything, thanks to LFR easily being skipped in the ilvl curve. The only thing it has going for it in terms of being enjoyable is the off-chance that I get entertainment from the other people there, either through finding someone I like or someone saying or doing something funny, but I have a better chance of achieving that by going to a city's trade chat. Of course, it's also good for simply seeing the content, but that trick only works once. It doesn't do justice to a system designed to be run through repeatedly.

LFR also presents a gear design challenge that makes me uncomfortable. With the return of somewhat-challenging 5-man heroics (as an alternative to 5-man max-level normals) in WoD, I worry that these heroics, while presenting something of a challenge, will have worse gear than LFR, which doesn't present a challenge. LFR, as a loot pinata, needs to avoid being too rewarding, or else it can have a negative impact on all content that provides worse gear.

[reesi cups]

Gearing up has always been easy, but when you get to where you need LFR stepping stone, then I don't like it. It's mostly because of the loot system and the item levels being an absurd amount.

[spectrefax]

After coming back to WoW and doing quite a bit of LFR recently and seeing that the LFR community is infinitely worse than it was when I left, back in Cata Dragon Soul, here's the steps I'm taking that have already begun to give a huge boost to my WoW gaming experience (bear in mind I also came back fresh... no friends, no guild).

Instead of logging on and preparing myself for a night of wipes, toxic chat, AFK players, verbal abuse, griefing, and all other forms of LFR asshatery, I now look forward to clearing things with people who aren't going to rage or be pricks at the first sign of trouble. And if they are, I just kick them. No "you can't kick in combat, for 2 more hours, during a roll," or whatever else. They're an ass? They're gone. Buh-bye.

Step 1: Pretend the LFR queue tool does not exist.
This is the first step to really improving your experiences. The damned thing is tempting because it's so convenient. Just pretend it doesn't exist and therefore you won't be tempted to queue up in hopes of achieving one of the minor upgrades that you'll quickly be replacing if you follow the next steps. Once you've convinced yourself that LFR doesn't exist, you'll realize you have to do something else for your progression and you'll get moving.

Step 2: Figure out what you want to run and when you want to run it.
Pretty self explanatory. If you want to run Flex 1 tomorrow at 6pm server, mark it on your in-game calendar as a note to yourself.

Step 3: Study the encounters if you don't know them.
Before the time you set on step 2, simply take 15-30 minutes and head over to YouTube, watch the strat videos you need for the bosses of the wing you're going to do. Pay attention! You'll need this information later. Maybe even jot down a couple notes or two about important abilities or something you might forget when it comes time to run the raid.

Step 4: Install Oqueue if you don't have it already.
Install Oqueue addon from Solid Ice: http://solidice.com/oqueue/ and read a quick user guide here: http://wow.joystiq.com/2013/09/22/oq...ing-on-demand/

Step 5: Start your group.
When it comes time for your raid, start a new raid in Oqueue, set your min ilvl requirements and such, and form your group. Drop a quick 'hello' and ensure your group is good to go. Instruct anyone on anything they need to know from the videos you watched, or just have a general strategy macro made up. Then, start killing bosses and collecting loot way better than LFR gear. Kick anyone who starts any shit or isn't doing what they signed up to do. Don't even hesitate, not for a minute; just boot them and keep your raid smooth and fun. This is why you started the raid, to keep your experience top-notch and fun.

Do this any night you want to clear something. There you go, LFR problem solved. Endless nights of running whatever you want, whenever you want. Enjoy.