What Wrath players need to know to not suck at Cata!

[Deepone]

7.) You are more than just “big numbers!” Simply because your role or spec is “dps” doesn’t mean you can’t throw out a heal, a dispel, or a cleanse, or even pick up a stray add. Did the healer just die? Does your class have some healing spells? Well, you’d BETTER have those on your bar, because it’s time to show what you’re made of. Pick up the healing and save your group!

^ This! It should be a loading screen Tip

No, that should be the splash-screen. And it should roar. Loudly.

When I'm dpsing and we wipe, my first thought is usually, "how did that happen?" if I don't know already (usually I do). My second thought is, "why didn't I prevent it?" My third thought is, "I wonder if that loudmouth DPSer who's complaining that it's the tank or healer's fault is wondering the same thing... probably not." Hint: don't like long queue times? Solve problems rather than annoying the tank or healer to the point that they put you on ignore. Every time they do, your queue times go up a little bit.

But you'll get a lot of arrogance around these topics. You saw it early on in Wrath with lots of people suddenly convinced that raiding was a cake-walk, and completely forgetting that it wasn't. Then they tried to do hard-modes in Ulduar and it got real quiet all of a sudden. Now you look around and they're back. It's just a long-term memory deficiency. They're convinced that a fight is "easy" if they out-gear it rather than recalling that it was actually hard in the appropriate gear. The ones my hat goes off to are the guys that were doing everything they could in ilvl 200 blues. They can speak to what encounters are well-tuned and require hard work vs. those that don't.

[Sinnaa]

Actually, I find that such players are just confused about what "good" and "bad" are. "Good" players are the ones who know what to expect. They're the ones who can look at a warrior doing low dps and say, "I need you to to get off the keyboard and start using your mouse and strafing keys for movement because you're OOR for 43% of your white damage swings. If you don't have that all set up, do it now and we'll go duel outside so you can test it out, because these other 23 people would rather wait 10 minutes than wipe again." The "bad" players are the ones who say, "WTF low dps fail!

That may be the most retarded thing i have ever read.... i dont know ANYONE who wants to put off raiding to wait for some baddie to learn his class. They should already know their class before stepping into a raid. It is what test dummies are for...isnt it? Why the hell should I waste the time of 24 other people because he cant figure out his class? Cause WoW is so hard right? i have yet to play a class that i couldnt figure out in like 10 min.

And as for knowing what to expect... did you even read my first post? That is exactly what it referred to. People should know to expect that bads are going to stay bad. I wasn't saying cata was going to fail...i was saying players are going to fail, like they always have. Keyboard turners are gonna keyboard turn, people with shitty video cards are gonna stand in shit (and even people with good ones), etc etc etc...

:-) why dont you come to BR and spend some time with the guy in question? Hmm? if you're so willing to do it, step up. Don't talk about it, be about it.

Also...dueling outside a raid instance....TOTALLY a good idea... TOTALLY safe.

[Deleted]

The only thing that really matters is if Cata 5-mans remain some sort of challenge for the new or undergeared, as that's really the only purpose should serve. Wrath Heroics were easy for competent players even in T6 gear.

Cata 5-mans are going to be rendered obsolete with time and gear; 5-mans have always been that way. BC Heroics were a joke with any geared group by the time Sunwell came around. I hope Blizzard repeats the Sunwell strategy and introduces a new 5-man well-tuned for the current gear level with each new major content patch. By T6 only Magister's Terrace offered a challenge, and that got some nerfs quickly if I recall correctly.

Cataclysm's real strength will be the polish of the Heroic mode feature in raids; people looking for a massive new bump in difficulty in 5-mans are going to be disappointed by reality. They'll challenge you until you're geared (like they're supposed to) and stop challenging you when you outgear them (like they're supposed to).

[Deepone]

Yes, the role of the tank is to traditionally handle pulling, rest breaks, marking, deciding what mobs you want CC'd, etc... That's fine.

Actually, back in TBC when CC was required, it usually wasn't the tank that was marking. Sometimes it was, but more often than not, it was the CCers who knew what they were supposed to be doing on the 7-pulls in HSlabs or HSP, and would offer to mark appropriately and usually were taken up on it.

You can perform your role as a tank without acting like a douchebag.

No, I think being a douchebag is different from being an arrogant tank. Arrogant tanks are the ones who don't think about the risks they're taking and blame someone else when those risks don't pay off. A great example, again from leveling recently, was where a tank cleared only half of the mobs leading up to the last boss and then ran ahead with the healer at half-mana. Sure, that's probably not going to be an issue, but if someone gets too close to that other group, you're going to have a problem. As it was, I was the healer and I died because exactly that happened. We had a dpser who was a guidlie of mine and we were on Mumble. I asked him to pick up heals and he did. The rest of the party lived, but when I pointed out that this was not the best way to do this, the tank started berating the dpser that got too close instead of acknowledging that they'd made a bet that failed to pay off and a good dpser had saved them from a wipe.

It's not about his being rude, it's about failing to consider the nature of the content and the level of play being exhibited around them. Simply treating everyone as a die-hard veteran and then chewing them out when they're not is inexcusably bad. It's a tank's job not to be that bad and to instead have an understanding of the level of risk they can take at any given time and how it will pay off or not.

[Sinnaa]

No, actually, he's right - and that sort of patience and hands-on instruction was much more common in Vanilla and to a lesser extent in TBC when people didn't just grab replacements from trade or recruit some guy cross-server. Guilds went to war with the armies they had - and worked to improve them the rest of the time.

Why that ceased to be the case is a complex question I won't attempt to answer here. Blizzard is trying to force that sort of commitment through guild mechanics, and I think it's a bad idea because it doesn't address the root causes of the problem - what changed so that players don't feel compelled to teach each other.

But Deepone is fundamentally right that sort of observation and insight and ability to judge skill in others is itself a major part of skill.

I agree and disagree.... yes, people need to be more willing to help each other. However, they don't need to be doing it in a raid. Do it in a town, before raid, etc. Don't waste other peoples time because you cant figure shit out IMO.

I have helped a lot of people out by working with them, sometimes for hours (this shit isnt that hard that it should take that long), and I am usually willing to do that now... but not in a raid.

[Mithan]

I don't care how people play alone but when they come into a Group Situation, their performance has a direct impact on the group and all members of the group. Likewise, the attitude of the experienced players matters as well, sometimes much more than one weak player.

People don't need to be the best player in the world in order to Group, however out of respect and common courtesy for the other people in the group, they should at a minimum, come prepared to learn/improve their skills.

Obviously, the more experienced people in the group should recipricate and not be assholes and offer that help in as kindly a way as possible.



I have no issue with somebody learning.
I have issues with the people who have no idea what they are doing and who instantly dig in and refuse all help and in the process hurt the group.
I also have issues with joe-superstar that thinks the group should be going Mach10 and acts like a retard in his attempts to "quicken the group".

For the former, I have no problem going slower and taking double or triple the time to do an instance and wiping a dozen times.
For the two laters, I just dont have the patients anymore and either leave or kick them.

[cathedra]

We can only hope that Blizz won't cave like they did in BC
I was absent a lot of WoTLK cause it was just a grind and dps-fest. I was bored with it all - no challenge.

[deven04]

It's a good post, don't get me wrong. It's just labeled wrong. It applies to every expansion Blizz ever released, not just Wrath. And yeah, I didn't kill LK HM pre 15% or 20%. Not many guilds in the world did. I'm still happy with our kill and where it landed. I'm not a wannabe elitist. I am an elitist ;D

This is awesome lol.....

[Tykus]

Very nice and helpful content here. Thx for the time you invested mate.

[Deepone]

That may be the most retarded thing i have ever read....

Welcome to the Internet, I hope you decide to stay after you discover how high your expectations actually are ;-)

i dont know ANYONE who wants to put off raiding to wait for some baddie to learn his class.

That. That, right there is the arrogance and failure to understand tradeoffs that leads to frustration and doom. You can wipe and complain later or you can wait a short time while a problem gets solved. You opt for the former because the latter means waiting NOW and the former can be arm-waved away with misguided expectations. I've seen people go from OORing nearly half of their white damage to being one of the best raiders a guild had. I've seen reasonably competent raiders never improve. I'd rather have the former.

They should already know their class before stepping into a raid.

I have never seen this happen. Any new raiding member is either already experienced from raiding elsewhere or doesn't know half of what they think they do, and what they think they know isn't even enough.

It is what test dummies are for...isnt it?

And there we have it. You're one of those players that would have to be taken under-wing and taught that training dummies are now mostly useless in an environment where the difference between sub-par and acceptable is entirely based around reactive abilities, many of which trigger on conditions that can't be fulfilled by a training dummy. Certainly for the example I gave, you can't learn on a dummy since they never move.

Why the hell should I waste the time of 24 other people because he cant figure out his class? Cause WoW is so hard right?

Hard and complex are different things. I have a minimum of 6 macros (usually many more) per class and spec and a minimum of 10 abilities I need to use consistently with an extra 3-8 situational abilities depending on the class. On top of that, I need to handle movement, situational awareness and build a model for how everyone around me is going to behave and what their capabilities are. I need to worry about latency, gearing, enchanting, gemming, tokens, points, factions, caps and what's on fire under my feet.

WoW is an order of magnitude more complex than my day job. But hard? No, it's not really very hard most of the time. That doesn't mean that someone who hasn't learned all of the above is "bad."

[Buraz]

Very nice and helpful content here. Thx for the time you invested mate.

same ...hope Cata will be hard with no early nerfs if peps start to QQ for many wiping

[Irascible]

Correct usage would be:

What's crackin?'

The apostrophe goes outside the punctuation. SICK.

[Sinnaa]

Welcome to the Internet, I hope you decide to stay after you discover how high your expectations actually are ;-)



That. That, right there is the arrogance and failure to understand tradeoffs that leads to frustration and doom. You can wipe and complain later or you can wait a short time while a problem gets solved. You opt for the former because the latter means waiting NOW and the former can be arm-waved away with misguided expectations. I've seen people go from OORing nearly half of their white damage to being one of the best raiders a guild had. I've seen reasonably competent raiders never improve. I'd rather have the former.



I have never seen this happen. Any new raiding member is either already experienced from raiding elsewhere or doesn't know half of what they think they do, and what they think they know isn't even enough.



And there we have it. You're one of those players that would have to be taken under-wing and taught that training dummies are now mostly useless in an environment where the difference between sub-par and acceptable is entirely based around reactive abilities, many of which trigger on conditions that can't be fulfilled by a training dummy. Certainly for the example I gave, you can't learn on a dummy since they never move.



Hard and complex are different things. I have a minimum of 6 macros (usually many more) per class and spec and a minimum of 10 abilities I need to use consistently with an extra 3-8 situational abilities depending on the class. On top of that, I need to handle movement, situational awareness and build a model for how everyone around me is going to behave and what their capabilities are. I need to worry about latency, gearing, enchanting, gemming, tokens, points, factions, caps and what's on fire under my feet.

WoW is an order of magnitude more complex than my day job. But hard? No, it's not really very hard most of the time. That doesn't mean that someone who hasn't learned all of the above is "bad."

ROFL at everything you just said...seriously... rofl...
1.) no shit the internet full of retarded things, just wanted to point out that it was one of them
2.)its not arrogance at all... people dont want to, its a simple fact. go ask around how many people want to wait for some tard to learn to play while they are trying to raid on a limited time budget.... most will say screw that. Why? because if they couldnt learn it in 80 levels, basic gearing through heroics, etc. then they arent going to learn it in the next 10 min while you go outside and duel...
3.) you are telling me that you can't learn a class in 80 levels? you cant learn a class in heroics? you cant learn a class by sitting on dummies to build a fundamental rotation??? really? are you that bad? I have 5 80's.... i knew how to play each and every one of them WELL before i stepped into a raid. Maybe youre a baddie who didnt take the time to learn your own class, but most the people worth raiding with probably did. And sure, some people got taught in raids, but they didnt do it with groups going for 6-10 hardmodes and a 12/12 clear i bet.
4.) seriously with the stupidity again??? test dummies have a lot of value for learning your rotation and fundamentals. No they don't give you a dynamic environmental, but most people who fail dont even know what the hell they should be pushing and when. learn your rotation before you try to perform your rotation while dodging shit. After you learn it on the dummy...USE HEROICS to learn how to use it on the fly... build groups that are all shit geared as well so you actually have a chance to do something..... dont step into ICC with blue gear maybe? maybe go use them in naxx...then uld....then toc... then icc??? People need to know they are bad so that maybe they will step it into gear and figure shit out....which we all know they really wont.
We were also talking about a shadowmourne user here.... he has OBVIOUSLY spent a lot of time learning the fights and shouldnt really be figuring out the dynamic environment....
5.) you just made wow sounds a lot harder than it really is.... its really just this for a dps... dodge shit, stand behind boss, spam buttons...thats really all it is. Yes, you need a little more to go from good to great... but most people arent even good that i am referring too.
and it really does mean that they are bad. it takes 10 min to google a class and find a decent post about them... another 10-20 min to read that post and figure it out. And where the hell do you work that wow is more complex than your job???
6.) i would MAYBE listen to you if you had a half decent character linked at the bottom of your page, but im pretty sure my worst alt is better than that.

[Rockford_Fosgate]

After I read about how Cata dungeons will be like TBC with the CCing, I'm happy and sad at the same time. It's nice to be back to using strategy for each mob pulls which means it's hard again. But during all my TBC runs, I was the tank, an uber tank too. As much as I like tanking and using strategy, I'm NOT looking forward to marking the mobs again. It just became a burden for me and too much work after doing it for a long time. Tanked all the way from beginning of TBC to the end of WOTLK. Also, when you groupped back in TBC, the lead role was automatically passed to you so you could mark. Now everyone could mark and hopefully they don't expect me to do it all the time, if so, I'm going dps this time.

[Raldrag]

LoL I'll post this thread in my guild forum!
With all your rights!

[kerber23]

So, this has now been added as the Guild Message and the vent greeting. I really want to thank you for making this post! As WOTLK was my first end game content I thaught most of the fights were easy. I am hoping you are right and fights in Cata will be more like Halion Heroic and LK Heroic.

[alexgame]

Well done! These are very good tips Daetur, thank you for posting them. I heard some of these from my Old Guild Leader, it's just a good memory sorry I had to write this down

[strifeseh]

Very good post, started in BC here and I've watched a lot of what has been mentioned erode from the game (myself included on the dps/tank angles) and it's nice to be reminded that we'll need to step up and relearn these.

[Bluedevil21]

Wow, you couldn't be more off. xD Let me try to fix that for you. It'll be hard to salvage this much failure, but I think I can. This is a mni-guide for how DPS needs to handle Cata raiding, and raiding in general. I'm not going to discuss tanking or healing, since it's so simple. If you don't already know how to handle heroic LK 25 in T9 gear, you just fail. Stop trying and quit WoW, gtfo my internet. X3 Moving on now to the most complex part of the game, DPS!

1) Positioning Is Someone Else's Job: Knockbacks? Cleaves? This is meaningless busy work for players that could be doing more DPS. Stand wherever you're in rage and go JOHN FUCKING MADDEN. if you get knocked back, it's the tank's problem. If you get hit in an AOE or a cone, let the healer deal with it. A good raider doesn't need to worry about these things because their DPS is maximized. Which brings me to the next thing to remember.

2) Communication is for RPers: You know best. Never let yourself forget that, or the entire game population will walk all over you. If someone doesn't know a fight, you need to jump on them immediately with a barrage of "gj moron" and "fail, noob". Fail players need to learn this isn't tolerated in endgame, and the best way to weed out scrubs is to be brutal. The slightest failure needs to be dragged into the open and blame assigned ASAP. Don't know who to blame? Just pick a name. Everyone else fails anyway.

3) This Is Your Game, Not Theirs: You're the boss. You bought the game and pay a subscription fee with your mom's hard-earned money, so why should you need to suffer fools? If you don't know something, wing it. Don't bring it up, or fail drama queens will eat you alive. Anyone that gets upset at all is insulting you. Take things personally and be aggressive towards other players, but never let yourself forget that you are right. If you really can't find any explanation besides a mistake (which you never make), it's clearly because the game is unbalanced against your class. Blame Ghostcrawler.

4) Don't Wait: Groups fall apart at the drop of the hat, you can't afford to let it happen by trying people's patience! Keep your raid going at a high pace. Don't stop to explain fights or strategize on trash when more time could be spent DPSing. The ideal raid is a constant chain-pull from beginning to end, and if you can't manage that, you fail.

Someone quick, give this man his own blog regarding this!

[Laslow]

I would say a majority of the Wrath "Baby" DPSers need to follow this guide.

1. Browse using your favorite web browser to http://www.google.com
2. In the "search box" use the following template replacing the information in the <> with YOUR information: "4.0.3 <spec> <class> rotation" and click "I'm Feeling Lucky"

Should help with those who still can't manage to BURST over 3K in full T10.