M+ Hot Take: M+ is not meant to be pugged

[Nymrohd]

1-14 keys are usually non-toxic and fine. 15 keys are usually toxic af. 20+ keys are usually non-toxic, though people do tend do get upset if something fails - but not near the toxicity you see in 15 keys.

This is my experience as well. 15 keys are filled with people who just want to get this over with and can be very aggressive against anyone messing up and "wasting their time". Earlier keys are mostly people who either enjoy M+ or want to improve their ratings and thus accept others might also be on a learning curve. And obviously how much someone will perceive others as toxic has to do with their role. Healers but especially tanks are more likely to get abuse.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

The logistical problem with the idea is what really differs a pug from a nonpug to the game identifying. You could have like an arena team style system but then people just leave and join as they need to to get keys done. Place restrictions on this so it doesn't happen? Then you just put up a huge barrier of entry to higher end m+. Not to mention a whole other RMT train of selling slots, carry groups, and in general just a lot of things the game doesn't need more of.

M+ is good because it can fail at 1 but can go to 30+ with anyone if they got the skill. At some key level it reaches a point that just a pure random pug mostly stops working anyways. You either know and play with them often or know of them and know they can get it done. The more natural flow of it is just how it should be in my opinion. It allows that point to float based on skill level and not arbortration of some rule. So people that struggle at 10 start to ban together to hit 12s and people that struggle at 15 to ban together to hit a 17 as they work and play together. So on so forth up and down the board.

[MoFalcon]

M+ is great fun with a group of friends.

Solo, it is easily one of the most miserable experiences this game has to offer.

As solo;

-the toxicity you have to endure, even if not directed at you, is some of the worst I have seen outside of a MOBA.

-the pressure to preform is at an elevated level, beyond that of just rolling with friends, likely contributing to the toxicity problem.

-the wait times are horrendous if you are a dps. Even if you are assembling your own group. You either have to wait on a tank or a healer, or you spend a good chunk of your play time getting rejected, applying to join other groups.

all of this sounds like excuses a poor player would use.

I'm no mythic raider, if anything, Casual + at best, but as a tank or a dps, if you stay in your lane, build up your score and gradually work your way up to higher keys, its not so bad. I dont mind spending the first couple weeks building my score up....5's and 6's......8's and 10's...eventually getting a couple 12's and 15's then you can stay at 15 or so, or try to go higher. By then, you know the routes "most" people use. You know what's expected of you and of others. I really haven't had a bad M+ experience at all. I enjoy doing it.

[Freighter]

This is my experience as well. 15 keys are filled with people who just want to get this over with and can be very aggressive against anyone messing up and "wasting their time". Earlier keys are mostly people who either enjoy M+ or want to improve their ratings and thus accept others might also be on a learning curve. And obviously how much someone will perceive others as toxic has to do with their role. Healers but especially tanks are more likely to get abuse.

The problem stems from people who are not consistent enough to get the key back to where they want it if it gets depleted or someone leaves. If someone leaves or we deplete a +15 I have that I'm doing just for weekly, I know it'll be back to 15 under less than an hour and thus I don't care a lot if it doesn't get timed or if someone leaves. Others take days to get their key back to the level they want it, if they ever manage to do it again that week.

I've done +23s on my main as the highest keys as a healer and +21 as tank, so +15s are rather trivial to me in terms of difficulty.

[stoffe]

My and a tank friend pug all 20 for tp's before this season ended, went pretty well. We also made some new freinds that we gonna play with now in S4.

If you just get into toxic groups probably yourself that is the toxic one.

[VinceVega]

Mh why though?

If someone wants to PuG they should do it.
The only problem rigth now is, that people complain they don't get a group for a 10+ with 0 keys done and cry elitist.
And that they enter a gamemode with complete anonymity and people you will probably never see again and then complain about toxicity when they don't know what to do. and waste everbodies time.

That is a problem of the PuG world. Not specifically mythic+/raiding or MMOs. Look at lol. Most toxic gaming community besides FPS games there is. Why? Anonimity.
Play with a guild and all your problems are gone in 99% of cases because if you are with people in discord they tend to be a good deal nicer.

[notthebees]

Interesting "take" from someone whose last thread was "ksm is too easy", and other classics like "wq players should have same ilvl as mythic raiders".

I'm sure your first post will be the last one yet again.

[Accendor]

Cap m+ to +15 for pugs. For higher keys, bring back the old Arena teams interface and make it so you can only do keys as that team. Would make it a lot more interesting and reduce the pugging issues.

I don't know man, I did 3000 rating two seasons in a row now with pugs and I am a DD.
It really is not that much of an issue except for the first two weeks after a patch, were you literally spend 90% of your time in queue and like 50% of the keys fail.

[Jastall]

I mentioned earlier in the thread that I haven't seen a lot of toxicity in PuGs overall, but this is the one place I do consistently see it anytime I am not the one making the group, and I wonder if it contributes partially to the huge divide in experiences. People tend to invite the people with the highest scores that sign up -- and on a surface level, why wouldn't you? -- but I think it's generally a mistake. Most people know intuitively not to invite people with really low score, but I don't think too many people consider the risks of high score players in low key runs.

Unless you're doing a +2 where it can be a total clownshow but you're still going to easily +3 a key with a crazy good dpser, inviting people with a score massively above the level you're doing is a recipe for disaster IMO. Although you'll get chill people farming valor or carrying a shitty friend on occasion, I feel like the majority of the time I invite someone massively overscore a key level, they come in with very unreasonable expectations and get mad when the key doesn't go as if everyone else has that same level of gear and experience. They are also are more prone to ditching after a single wipe or big mistake, and much more likely to demand you do specific routes or strategies. If I'm running a +8, it's probably because I just hit 60 and my gear is shit, and maybe the other people in the group have done like four keys ever, and sure my healer buddy may have a 3k main but this is the first time he's ever healed a keystone before and so probably we're not going to be doing huge pulls and MDI level skips.

If I'm listing an alt's 13 key, for example, I'll take a 2600 person before a 3200 person just because I feel like there's much better odds that the guy just above KSM is more familiar with what kind of performance level to expect from kind of players who are running 13s. I'm generalising, but if I invite a guy who normally does mid-20s keys to my shitty alt run, they often come in expecting everyone else to operate at the same level as them and are frustrated when that doesn't happen, and toxicity happens. It's better for everyone involved -- them included -- if we just avoid that scenario.

I once made the mistake of inviting a 2900 from Tichondrius (the most toxic players always come from there in my experience) who was carrying a friend to my 10 as a BDK alt. Guy darn near blew a gasket because I didn't drag the red slime back to the first boss in Plaguefall. Bruh, it's a 10 and you're a fully geared Surv hunter, the fuck does it matter when the boss melts in under a minute. Another time Wo relic got activated instead of Urh and he spend a good minute whining about it in chat. Sorry princess, you might have 1k less DPS on meters that nobody but you cares about. The very sheer horror.

Key got +3'd and all but I'd much rather have had someone with half the DPS and a better attitude. People insisting on doing MDI skips in +15 are also infuriating. Nothing annoys me more than metaslaves. This being why I avoid keys higher than 17.

[Relapses]

I once made the mistake of inviting a 2900 from Tichondrius (the most toxic players always come from there in my experience) who was carrying a friend to my 10 as a BDK alt. Guy darn near blew a gasket because I didn't drag the red slime back to the first boss in Plaguefall. Bruh, it's a 10 and you're a fully geared Surv hunter, the fuck does it matter when the boss melts in under a minute. Another time Wo relic got activated instead of Urh and he spend a good minute whining about it in chat. Sorry princess, you might have 1k less DPS on meters that nobody but you cares about. The very sheer horror.

Key got +3'd and all but I'd much rather have had someone with half the DPS and a better attitude. People insisting on doing MDI skips in +15 are also infuriating. Nothing annoys me more than metaslaves. This being why I avoid keys higher than 17.

Dude in your example is an obvious toolbox but being a metaslave isn't exactly a bad thing. Why do you care if other people want to optimize their experience in this game?

[Twdft]

Dude in your example is an obvious toolbox but being a metaslave isn't exactly a bad thing. Why do you care if other people want to optimize their experience in this game?

Problem isn't being a metaslave but 3k players expecting 2.5k players to do their 3k tactics in a +15. That red slime is a good example. Even without a necrolord you can stand in the puddle for a nice haste buff. It just needs to be healed. Which not every healer in a pug 15 is capable of.

[Relapses]

Problem isn't being a metaslave but 3k players expecting 2.5k players to do their 3k tactics in a +15. That red slime is a good example. Even without a necrolord you can stand in the puddle for a nice haste buff. It just needs to be healed. Which not every healer in a pug 15 is capable of.

I guess. It does almost no damage on a 15 or lower, I don't think it's a huge deal and hardly worth throwing a tantrum over but if the group is on board I don't see the harm.

[Fitsu]

M+ is great fun with a group of friends.

Solo, it is easily one of the most miserable experiences this game has to offer.

As solo;

-the toxicity you have to endure, even if not directed at you, is some of the worst I have seen outside of a MOBA.

-the pressure to preform is at an elevated level, beyond that of just rolling with friends, likely contributing to the toxicity problem.

-the wait times are horrendous if you are a dps. Even if you are assembling your own group. You either have to wait on a tank or a healer, or you spend a good chunk of your play time getting rejected, applying to join other groups.

-Even if the previous three aren't an issue, it has the same pitfalls as any pugs, in that people aren't always on the same page. Examples like unfamiliar routes, unintended mob pulls, wasted cooldowns, and a whole host of other coordination problems.

With no alternative end game content, it is as if Blizzard is trying to de-incentivize solo play.

As content gets harder it's less pug-friendly. In other news water is wet and steam is hot.

What point are you trying to make here as I don't see one.

[Jastall]

Dude in your example is an obvious toolbox but being a metaslave isn't exactly a bad thing. Why do you care if other people want to optimize their experience in this game?

When they try to force this mindset unto others in content where it's really not needed.

Metaslaves aren't just those who follow the meta where appropriate. It's those who insist the meta must always be followed no matter what context. Even in a +16 it's really not a big deal if the tank, for example, doesn't follow the MDI standard order in ToP but I've seen two people go ballistic over it in chat.

As I said, they're thankfully rare, but it becomes worse the higher up you climb.

[Relapses]

When they try to force this mindset unto others in content where it's really not needed.

Metaslaves aren't just those who follow the meta where appropriate. It's those who insist the meta must always be followed no matter what context. Even in a +16 it's really not a big deal if the tank, for example, doesn't follow the MDI standard order in ToP but I've seen two people go ballistic over it in chat.

As I said, they're thankfully rare, but it becomes worse the higher up you climb.

Ah, I guess I see what you're saying. When I think of metaslave, I kind of put it in the context of how I play the game. Back in BfA, I mained a SPriest for M+ despite it being a pretty undesirable class. I pushed pretty high and I felt accomplished but then I rerolled to a BM Hunter and realized that I could do almost twice the damage, bring way more utility and in general have a much more favorable experience in keys. I never really looked back after that. I'll play whatever the meta says is best because it's easiest to push keys with and it results in a better experience over all for me.

[Jastall]

Ah, I guess I see what you're saying. When I think of metaslave, I kind of put it in the context of how I play the game. Back in BfA, I mained a SPriest for M+ despite it being a pretty undesirable class. I pushed pretty high and I felt accomplished but then I rerolled to a BM Hunter and realized that I could do almost twice the damage, bring way more utility and in general have a much more favorable experience in keys. I never really looked back after that. I'll play whatever the meta says is best because it's easiest to push keys with and it results in a better experience over all for me.

Just following the meta is understandable in a competitive game at higher difficulty settings. I don't see anything wrong with that, even if I personally will be caught dead before I ever main anything but a Warrior. To me metaslavery is more akin to a mindset that elevates following the meta into a veritable religion which is then imposed upon every player one plays with. There were a couple of those in my old guild and they were very, very annoying, I'd never run keys with them because I knew diverging from the preferred path for one pull would be, at best, met with instant disbelief. How could you not follow the meta?? Because it's my path and it works in this easy +15 key, dammit.

[Relapses]

Just following the meta is understandable in a competitive game at higher difficulty settings. I don't see anything wrong with that, even if I personally will be caught dead before I ever main anything but a Warrior. To me metaslavery is more akin to a mindset that elevates following the meta into a veritable religion which is then imposed upon every player one plays with. There were a couple of those in my old guild and they were very, very annoying, I'd never run keys with them because I knew diverging from the preferred path for one pull would be, at best, met with instant disbelief. How could you not follow the meta?? Because it's my path and it works in this easy +15 key, dammit.

Yeah, those people can be insufferable but I largely ignore them. If somebody is being particularly annoying I just toss 'em on my ignore list and finish the key. (Though I've had a few petulant children get mad and start int'ing a key when they realize they're being ignored. Real mature behavior.)

[pulsar]

Blizzard will lose way too much money if they took the pug out of M+. A lot of people would just quit.

Never going to happen.

[Rageonit]

I'm pugging about half of my runs and I'm always having a blast, so yeah, it's totally meant to be pugged.

[Trenbolone]

All of the game should be PUG friendly. ICC/Ulduar was one of the best raiding experience partly due to amout of PUGs.

So, hell no. If you like to run with your pals, run hard content with your pals. I dont have friends in game and i dont want to have friends in the game. Nobody would play this game today if you HAD to play with people.