ICC pugs - horror stories

[SilkforCalde]

I run ICC on my main with guild, but on my myriad array of alts, I pug this place. I'm not the type of person to get mad about raiding. I, instead, find horrible runs to be hilarious.

Last night, about 3 am server time, I joined a 10 man pug on my resto druid. My druid has about a 2930 wow-heroes, nothing too special. Good for my worst geared alt, good enough for ICC 10 man. I also had a guildie join on an alt, a slightly undergeared warrior tank (actually he's dps but agreed to tank, so he was very unfamiliar with tanking the place).

First, we have dps face pulling all kinds of pats during the Marrowgar trash. We don't wipe, but we come very close. So close that only a couple people were left standing. This was a bit worrying. When we told the MT, a pally tank, to face the caster mobs away from the group, he nerd raged on us. Even more worrying.

We down Marrowgar very smoothly for such a group, but myself and the sole other healer, a paladin healer, were busting our asses healing all the avoidable damage that people were taking. A bit strenuous, but I definitely prefer healing a fight that's in question over a fight where I zone out due to boredom. About this time I noticed the raid leader was awful. He was a warlock in a mix of PVP gear and heroic gear that was pushing about... oh, 1700 dps. Don't know how that's possible, but I don't have a warlock. My mage in that level of gear would've at least been pushing 4k.

Deathwhisper, well, it wasn't pretty. In fact it was incredibly sloppy. Phase 1 had a lot of ridiculous tank healing because they kept getting hit by the mutated adds, and even worse, the dps was so slow that nearly every add was transformed. Phase 2, soon as Deathwhisper's shield was down the rogue died. I battle rezzed him but people kept dying due to standing in D&D or getting hit by ghosts. Pretty standard for a pug. The worst was yet to come.

Lootship was a fight that I thought was pretty much free loot. Wiped twice due to an inexperienced tank dying almost immediately to Muradin. Went out of range, then got a huge stack of axes for the first wipe. Second wipe, just jumped way too soon and ate a facefull of stacked boss rage. Switched the tanks around and cleared the fight, only to meet the HARDEST BOSS OF ALL TIME.

Saurfang. Our group had two arcane mages, one warlock (doing a consistent 1700 dps, at least he was consistent), two rogues, and a death knight for dps. Before we engage, we explain to the warlock that he needs to stay at least 10 yards from the other players. He moves around, stands on random people, until we start yelling at him to move away. He does...

The fight starts, the warlock immediately runs DIRECTLY ON TOP OF ME. I move and dance around while he FOLLOWS ME. Then, neither beast was slowed until the DK turned around and chained one of them. The other was just chasing people around left and right. Both beasts were pretty much tanked, so I was healing my ass off. I had to shift to caster and root these suckers, it was just bad.

Saurfang's first mark went out at about 80%. His second went out about 60% and by then, things were too out of hand. I come back after the wipe and ask the mages to cast slow on the beasts. Neither mage had slow, even though they were arcane. They said no PVE spec for an arcane mage would have that ability so I told them to armory my mage, a mage that can do about 7k dps on 10 man Saurfang (nothing special, decent for an alt I've only had at 80 for a few weeks) whereas those slackers could barely push 4k. I have slow, seems to be useful enough to spend a talent point on. So, with no reliable snares, no reliable ranged dps, a warlock pushing 1700 dps... I left. First time I haven't downed Saurfang in a pug in weeks, although wiping twice on lootship made me almost die laughing so I wasn't feeling it that much at that point.

ICC 10 man normal mode is DAMN HARD SON

[I stand in fire]

you have it good, some ICC PUGs on my server don't get past LDW. ._.

[Siddarta]

I come back after the wipe and ask the mages to cast slow on the beasts. Neither mage had slow, even though they were arcane. They said no PVE spec for an arcane mage would have that ability so I told them to armory my mage, a mage that can do about 7k dps on 10 man Saurfang (nothing special, decent for an alt I've only had at 80 for a few weeks) whereas those slackers could barely push 4k. I have slow, seems to be useful enough to spend a talent point on.

ICC 10 man normal mode is DAMN HARD SON

Wait so you screamed at the mages because they specced right and you and a paladin (paladin can take 2 marks by himself), couldnt keep up with 2 marks?

im confused.

[SilkforCalde]

Wait so you screamed at the mages because they specced right and you and a paladin (paladin can take 2 marks by himself), couldnt keep up with 2 marks?

im confused.

I didn't scream at anyone.

We couldn't keep up with two marks AND people tanking blood beasts AND undergeared tanks eating a lot of damage. And the fight was at 60%.

Regardless of those mages speccing or not, we had no snares for the beasts. That means the raid was bound to fail. If, however, they HAD used a single talent point to spec into a snare, we would've possibly been able to down the fight. Without a snare, it was quite literally impossible.

[Gaarheid]

That is the reason I hardly ever pug.

[Draeneiia]

Actually very few arcane mages take slow...

And you say you had a DK in the raid? Hell, when I tank Saurfang I still have time to throw chains on the adds.

But still, 4k from arcane mages is like a third of what the should be doing... and 1,7 from a warlock... I would have left that group before Marrowgar...

[Twoflower]

The only mages that take slow are the mages that want to do less dps than they would with a optimal spec.

[Shirimasen]

I;ve had anything between wipes on trash and marrowgar, and downing various wings, and doing heroic modes.

It varies a lot.

[Deleted]

This one time I pugged and people were so bad I made 10 paragraphs about it!

[Nikoll]

i blue screened on marrowar this week. i havnt been back on since...

[Deleted]

I take slow for this purpose (as well as other similar beneficial fights).

And I *WILL* accept a hit to my DPS in order to make a fight doable whether guild or pug.

[Hibufu]

The only mages that take slow are the mages that want to do less dps than they would with a optimal spec.

I personally took Slow simpy because that tiny bit of DPS won't help if people die to saurfang adds due to lack of snare or hell even for LK if the valkyr is going over defile. I call that free utility.

[Taun]

My wors run was some weeks ago. And this will haunt me along time. We had a pallytank that actually was really good geared. Problem was i kept seeing him casting exorcism. Which is fine in a pull situation etc. But not while tanking 2 big bone guys. I told him " stop using exo while they're hitting you, youre taking away all you avoidance"

Apperantly the guy saw a parry in his SCT and therefore told me i was a tard cause casting didn't take away any avoidance, he just parried. I continued to tell him, if he did something like that one festergut for example(which he hadn't killed). He would get instagibbed, or atleast almost.

I just couldn't stay in that group. With a tank I needed to twoheal with a sloppy priest Through fester etc when he didn't know a basic thing such as "your gonna get hit when casting". Guess why tanks don't heal themeselves....

And for the record. 1 point for slow is awesome for saurfang heroic. Just sayin.

[jegerlee]

1. You do imba guildruns on your main
2. You do shitty PuGs on your alts
3. Your alts of same class -> their mains

This story has been told countless times before, it is expected 90% of the time and you still sound surprised.
Arcane mages don't take Slow since it's situational:
A. their guild is doing 10 man only and don't have other classes to support slowing effects.
B. they do 25 man content and rely on totems, traps, shackle etc for slowing.

But according to your description they were just clueless.

Convince your guild to do alt runs instead.
GL with further pugging though, I've come to the decision a long time ago, that I care too much for my nerves for PuGs.

[Rootofalleli]

I wasn't lucky enough to be there, but a few of my guildies were doing 10m IC on alts and had an awful tank. He was your typical "i no the fights, ok!?!?!" pug tank who had never been past Lady D. So my guildies asked people to hop in vent to make things easier. Despite this, he tanked the blood beasts every time, and, when asked what on earth he was doing, replied, "I'm tanking, because I'm a tank! Get off my back and dps already."

[Samin]

The only mages that take slow are the mages that want to do less dps than they would with a optimal spec.

You fail at being a mage. You know that?
You're probably the rogue/dps warrior who refuses to debuff armor reduction (because nobody else can do it) because it decreases you dps by 50 while it increases raid dps by 500.

[Obirah]

Doesn't seem like a horror story to me. Just a bad group.
Not replacing slackers after trash/first boss makes you all an equal part of that bad group, imo.

And you don't need slow as a pve arcane mage.
Just throw out a FFB for pretty much instant aggro + a small slowing effect on the beasts.

[lukerocks]

Horror Story - This 25 man pug i was in pulled both Stinky and Precious at the same time 3x in a row after 1 shotting everything including heroic gunship. 1 shot bosses, wipe 3x on trash. yay

[SilkforCalde]

The only mages that take slow are the mages that want to do less dps than they would with a optimal spec.

man, i don't think one point out of incanter's absorption will destroy your dps

[Puri]

The only mages that take slow are the mages that want to do less dps than they would with a optimal spec.

Imho there's a higher chance of saving the day by a well placed slow than saving the day because you did 100dps more. It's the same with destro locks not taking shadow fury. Or heal shamans not taking Nature's Swiftness. Or or or.
In 99% of all cases it's a wasted point. But in 1% it saves asses. Speaking for us, p.e. we had siginficantly more wipes on Saurfang or LK because of uncontrolled adds/valkyrs than (1)1% wipes. Actually I can't remember a single one.
But enough thread derailing...