I feel like I'm cursed or something...

[Deleted]

Okay, so ever since around the Alpha was released, I have had such bad luck with groups that you wouldn't believe it. I can manage in LFR, but anything above that just doesn't manage to down any reasonable boss. Today, I've been invited to normal SoO starting from Nazgrim. we killed him, then fell apart after 3 wipes on Nazgrim where multiple people failed on the first breath.

I've only done SoO on either of my 2 paladins so far (and once on my priest) that went further than LFR. I lost count of the number of groups that fell apart after I joined them. You probably think "Nzall, you're the reason they're falling apart, get better!" but that's not it. From the ones that I can remember:

I had at least 3 groups fail on Sha Flex because people weren't running over their sha pools (I was doing that properly)
I have had multiple groups fail on Malkorok due to missing soaks or people standing in the breath (I was doing my part here).
I have had multiple garrosh groups fail on engineers, on mind controls, on whirls,... Everything. I have to add for clarity that I fail myself on the iron star FAR more than i'd like to admit, because the AoE actually ends a little after the star;
I have had groups fail on Beltcrafter due to weapons (which I wasn't doing because paladins suck at it).
I've had groups fail on Spoils due to the bombed player hugging the healers.
I've had groups fail on Galakras because of the towers;
I've also had failures on Immerseus, Protectors, Dark Shamans and Thok. about the only boss I haven't had a group fail on yet is Iron Juggernaut.

EVERY SINGLE ONE of these groups failed for reasons beyond my influence. Either the DPS was too low, people were too shit at soaking, healers couldn't keep up with the raid damage, or we just failed at mechanics in general. I'm starting to feel like there's this curse on me that makes it so that groups that I join are destined to fail or something, like an aura of bad luck. Hell, I'm fairly sure that if I join a 14/14 hc group through bribery, they'd also start failing catastrophically. It doesn't even matter if I bring my 560 or my 547 paladin (and I want to bring my paladin because those are the only 2 with halfway decent gear).

I'm starting to get frustrated with the entire matter. I was hoping to get an Heirloom before 13/11, but if my luck continues, I think it's not that hopeful for me to even get my 4P or my second trinket on something different than LFR (if I even want to do LFR still, because I only need 2 more items and it's so boring).

I don't know if other people have the same issue as I have, but I wouldn't be surprised...

[chuachua]

You're a ret paladin that says paladins aren't good at belts? How are people supposed to take you seriously?

[Deleted]

You're a ret paladin that says paladins aren't good at belts? How are people supposed to take you seriously?

If you don't have the Galakras trinket, nor 4P, nor the legendary cloak or meta, and are on Flex where the weapons have as much HP as on normal instead of being nerfed as well, then yeah, you cannot solo weapons. BUT that's NOT the point here. I tried doing the belt, and I failed majestically at it. Meanwhile, we had a hunter who could solo his belts just fine but didn't do the disengage trick to spare me the trouble. I made a thread about it before, and people agreed with me that it wasn't my fault.

[Aucald]

My luck hasn't been so bad, but I chalked it up to the vast majority of skilled players and/or geared characters no longer needing LFR or Flex leaving both raid brackets with the remainder of players (some of whom are skilled but undergeared, and many of whom are simply the dregs of the playerbase). It's always going to be difficult for a raid to succeed when 3-4 players are pulling the majority of the weight and the rest of the raid is pretty much just along for the ride.

[Deleted]

If you don't have the Galakras trinket, nor 4P, nor the legendary cloak or meta, and are on Flex where the weapons have as much HP as on normal instead of being nerfed as well, then yeah, you cannot solo weapons.

That's like 3M hp? I'd find it very surprising you can't do 3M hp. You even have a couple of attacks that have 30y range. How long can you attack em for? 20 seconds? Probably more. That would mean you can't do 150k sustained. And it's not even sustained because you can easily save cd's for it. Just spec holy avenger and you got 3 cooldowns possible to rotate, and a potion as well.
And ofcourse it's the point.
"My group sucks, people fail on belts"
"Why don't you do it then?"
"I can't but the others should be able to."

[Deja Thoris]

It would be hilarious if you started failing on IJ after this!

May I suggest you level up your "how to pick decent groups" skill?

[Sonnillon]

If I join any PUG group 9/10 are absolutely horrible for me (been in some very awesome groups as well). If I create my own, they are all success. Your not cursed, you just a) aren't helping the group when they are failing (giving advice or whatnot) b) bad luck of judgement when joining a group c) just an averagely bad day.

[Illana]

I had at least 3 groups fail on Sha Flex because people weren't running over their sha pools (I was doing that properly)

What sha pools? This is flex and leads me to believe 1 of 2 things:

1. Your group is so terrible you are all getting over 50 pride and spawning projections. You are a direct contributor to this by not doing enough dps or standing where the adds spawn.
2. You think that you're supposed to stand in bursting pride.

I have had multiple groups fail on Malkorok due to missing soaks or people standing in the breath (I was doing my part here).

If you know how to do it, why not tell others how to as well? Even better, mark the smashes to make it easier for people.

I have had multiple garrosh groups fail on engineers, on mind controls, on whirls,... Everything. I have to add for clarity that I fail myself on the iron star FAR more than i'd like to admit, because the AoE actually ends a little after the star;

You can interrupt, you can use devotion aura during whirls, you can use hand of sacrifice and heal with selfless healer. It feels like you think contributing your bare minimum is enough to a raid full of pugs of varying skill and gear.

I have had groups fail on Beltcrafter due to weapons (which I wasn't doing because paladins suck at it).

If you don't have the Galakras trinket, nor 4P, nor the legendary cloak or meta, and are on Flex where the weapons have as much HP as on normal instead of being nerfed as well, then yeah, you cannot solo weapons. BUT that's NOT the point here. I tried doing the belt, and I failed majestically at it. Meanwhile, we had a hunter who could solo his belts just fine but didn't do the disengage trick to spare me the trouble. I made a thread about it before, and people agreed with me that it wasn't my fault.

That's hilarious, a ret pala at 547 or 560 is more than capable of soloing a flex or normal belt. Also flex belt hp IS reduced. You failed at doing a relatively simple job, it's not like it's 9.6million hp on heroic and you're soloing every belt. Maybe the hunter didn't know or wasn't comfortable with soloing the belt.

I've had groups fail on Spoils due to the bombed player hugging the healers.

use your raid cds to prevent deaths then. Devo aura or hand of sac on the healer would at least have saved one of them.

I've had groups fail on Galakras because of the towers;

so go up the towers yourself and make sure it's done properly.



Honestly it just sounds like you want a free ride in raids where other people carry you.

[Instrument]

You are in fact not cursed, you just don't contribute as much as you think you do ...
Sha pools on flex ? never heard of it
Not beeing able to solo belts as a retri because you lack 4 piece and Leg Cloak ? May I suggest that you get those ? the cloak takes about 6 ID's to obtain and in those 6 Id's you should be able to get your 4 piece bonus
If the groups are failing beyond your influence - open your own you can easily influence it by switching members then

[announced]

u might wanna try learning how to tank or be holy, tank pallys been super op this patch and u could have taken full advantage of it with ur 4set, but i digress. theres good ret pallys and theres bad ones. my friend joined a 7/14 heroic guild and was pulling his own weight way before he got any gear pieces ( i think he was up to 250k or so around like 560 ilvl) once he got his 4set he went up to like (320k) he still doesnt have the galakras heroic trinket or anything special but if u are smart and really good with ur class you can surpass ok players. u should really get ur leg cloak though, there have been buffs every weekend or so making it easier and easier to obtain.

as for flex u could try a few things. go right after the reset on tues, aim for high lvl groups or make ur own using oqueue, (theres no sha pools in flex thats only heroic btw) ( u want to run away from the multiple adds spawning, stay grouped before though so they all clump together)
malk u can just use whatever speed boosts to soak puddles or whatnot.
for all other encounters, most are self explanatory. ret pallys can do weps btw, ive had my friend do them in norm even though he does 300k dps so its lol but hey, whatever gets the kill is all i say.

if u really are good, try applying for a norm guild they will beat garrosh eventually, hes not that difficult. also try and record ur logs of fights maybe u will get some good references.

[TEHPALLYTANK]

If you don't have the Galakras trinket, nor 4P, nor the legendary cloak or meta

So you've neglected to do the legendary quest chain and then are surprised when you only get into groups that don't care how much effort people put into their character?

[Deleted]

I have the legendary cloak now. I did not at the time of the beltcrafter pug nor the meta. It was on a boosted paladin working on valor points part. . And are you guys really thinking that a 20 percent damage decrease is enough to survive malkorok smash or 5 bombs from spoils detonating on 2 players at once? Both of those are well over a million damage and would still oneshot a full hp player. The sha geroup had 3players below 100k dps and me at 140 to 150k.
I WAS NOT THE PROBLEM! I can do a lot of things but i dont have the utility to compensate for the stupidity of half a raid. On that malkorok pug i had 8 out of 25 players standing jn the breath. And even if i managed to save them all on the first one i still couldn't on the second because idon't have enough tricks up my sleeve.

[Dracodraco]

I have the legendary cloak now. I did not at the time of the beltcrafter pug nor the meta. It was on a boosted paladin working on valor points part. . And are you guys really thinking that a 20 percent damage decrease is enough to survive malkorok smash or 5 bombs from spoils detonating on 2 players at once? Both of those are well over a million damage and would still oneshot a full hp player. The sha geroup had 3players below 100k dps and me at 140 to 150k.
I WAS NOT THE PROBLEM! I can do a lot of things but i dont have the utility to compensate for the stupidity of half a raid. On that malkorok pug i had 8 out of 25 players standing jn the breath. And even if i managed to save them all on the first one i still couldn't on the second because idon't have enough tricks up my sleeve.

It doesn't really matter what you had or didn't have. I've been capable of doing flex belts at 520-525 ilvl on *casters* who can't stand still and cast up there (cycling instants during movement and hardcasting when possible). That you can't do it on a 545+ ilvl MELEE is just fucking laughable. Whomever agreed with you that it was the hunters fault for not doing every belt to let you breeze through was an idiot. No one requires hunters to do every belt outside of heroic, so a hunter doing flex would have fuck all knowledge of what to do. On the other hand, EVERY raid difficulty requires you to send dps to the belt.
Also, Malkorok's Breath with most peoples innate damage reductions and a devo on flex would turn into about 550-600K dmg. Plenty to survive.

In the end, pugs are what you make them. If people are stupid, tell them what to do. You can't put in the minimum effort and expect great results. If you want shit done properly, you do it yourself.

[Katchii]

In the end, pugs are what you make them. If people are stupid, tell them what to do. You can't put in the minimum effort and expect great results. If you want shit done properly, you do it yourself.

It's really difficult for people to learn what to do in encounters if no one takes the time to help them learn. It's also incredibly stupid for people to get upset at groups when they fail if you're not helping them do better.

Don't get pissed that the group failed, when you knew what to do, and didn't do anything about it, y'know like telling people what to do to keep them from dying?

Also, 3 Million HP in ~20 seconds should be doable by pretty much any DPS with 500+ ilevel if you use your cooldowns and toolkit properly... 520+ may not even need cooldowns.

Like others have said, it sounds like you're expecting to give minimal effort and get maximum return and you aren't contributing nearly as much as you think you are.

[Illana]

I have the legendary cloak now. I did not at the time of the beltcrafter pug nor the meta. It was on a boosted paladin working on valor points part. . And are you guys really thinking that a 20 percent damage decrease is enough to survive malkorok smash or 5 bombs from spoils detonating on 2 players at once? Both of those are well over a million damage and would still oneshot a full hp player. The sha geroup had 3players below 100k dps and me at 140 to 150k.
I WAS NOT THE PROBLEM! I can do a lot of things but i dont have the utility to compensate for the stupidity of half a raid. On that malkorok pug i had 8 out of 25 players standing jn the breath. And even if i managed to save them all on the first one i still couldn't on the second because idon't have enough tricks up my sleeve.

hand of sac is 30%, it seems you don't even know your class at all.

flex breath doesn't do 1million damage, it does 840k and the ancient barrier can almost absorb half of that, put on top 30% damage reduction from sac or 20% from devo aura its almost impossible to die from it.

150k dps at 547 ilevel is well below average. Sure there were other people doing worse but you could do a lot better.

[TEHPALLYTANK]

hand of sac is 30%, it seems you don't even know your class at all.

flex breath doesn't do 1million damage, it does 840k and the ancient barrier can almost absorb half of that, put on top 30% damage reduction from sac or 20% from devo aura its almost impossible to die from it.

150k dps at 547 ilevel is well below average. Sure there were other people doing worse but you could do a lot better.

Average ilvl is a pretty awful metric to use when assessing melee that are heavily skewed by weapon damage.

[Sonnillon]

Did you do anything to help the group out? Did you try to give them tactics? On some cases you just have to step up if you know what to do and try to lead the group yourself.

It is understandable if people just pull the boss w/o explaining what to do, assuming that people know what to actually. And the result will be a failed group. You pulling your weight as DPS is in a group with a failed leader not enough.

As long as you end up in bad groups with bad leaders and don't kinda tell people what they are suppose to do... You will end up in fail groups...

[Ealyssa]

1)improve your gameplay. Like allready said you are not as good as you seems to think.
2)find better PUG. I cleaned each avalaible wings of SoO flex from the first week on openraid (started with 515 ilvl I think). Did the meta achievment also on openraid. And now I raid normal with oQueue groups (ilvl requirement is a bit retarded on openraid nowadays. And I'm not the luckiest with loot still having lot of flex piece) and some tradechan guild group (I'm on one of the nigest EU server).

If you are good you'll make a name (even if probably harder as dps, even more as melee).

[Illana]

Average ilvl is a pretty awful metric to use when assessing melee that are heavily skewed by weapon damage.

you could do it even if you had a 450 weapon and 547 average.

[JemiS]

I was able to do belts on my Ret ~525 average level without cloak and meta the first week Flex opened up, so it's not about the class or the iLvl, it's about timing your CDs and pots. I also posted in that last thread, and I do not at all recall the consensus being that the hunter should have soloed it. I recall it being "why do people want a hunter to do it in Flex? That's a heroic strat" and "anyone should be able to solo the belts at ~520".

I'm still confused as to these puddles that people aren't soaking on Sha. I assume it's projections, but then just Devo people.

Sac might not save a healer from bombs dropped by a DPS, but you know what will? BoP. Take Clemency, BoP your healers so they don't die.

After the first few times through, there's really no excuse to die to to Iron Stars on Garrosh, other than your game freezing up on you. If people can't do engineers, then you can do them. Pop wings, judge, exo. Get a druid in your raid to Symb you, and spam Wrath.