the Wrath of Rath and other PvE annoyances

Hybuir · Post by **Hybuir** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 9:52 am

L'sigh.

This weekend I headed out with a ragtag group of misfits and made our way to Arcatraz for my 3rd key fragment for kara attunement. The group consisted of a prot warrior, a resto shaman, a hybrid warlock (27/34/0) by the name of Rath, a mage that was short on time, and yours truly, an arms/prot warrior. We started out sneaking in with some alliance outside, since neither of us has been versed enough in the instances in the zone to have received the key. Nonetheless we ventured forward, I said in party, I got battleshout, you can grab the commanding shout; fell upon deaf ears. Within the first couple of pulls, no one but myself saw the healer getting overwhelmed with the larvae that tend to spawn. The mage pulled agro and the elite made short work of him, then the lock. I was going 2h but did the sacrificial taunt to help with the survivability of the group. Eventually, we wiped. Time to rez, fly back. Immediately, I heard the screechy adolescent voice that was our warlock.

"Oh God," I muttered, off the record. My thumb made its way to the "Alright guys lets go ahead and give it another try." The warlock went on about how he got 2 shot, the usual warlock cries that don't take into consideration that they are grinding monsters, and the consensus is that they're overpowered. Again, we sneakily zoned in on the coattails of a horde party. I suggested that everyone hit V to see the little critters. Again we pulled, again we wiped; this was starting to aggravate me. I flew to the weapon master, 2.5g repair bill, better now than later. Rezoning in after the group lead called in a favor, the lock complained about his gear starting to turn colors, I looked at his health, a dwindling 6300. I started doing commanding shout for the HP buff.

The next pulls had promise, everything seemed balanced, but then it happened. I noticed that Omen wasn't registring the lock. Seems that he didn't have KTM or Omen because "I have vista." I quasi snapped. "What does that have to do with ANYTHING? You still download it, you still extract it, you still pop it in your addon folders. Take some time and do it now. It's a required addon." All the time being told "don't Ant., we've tried explaining it before." The kid rambled about how it's apparently different in Vista, I didn't listen to it. I cracked open a new Dr. Pepper 2 liter, and grabbed the biggest cup that was quasi clean, I was going to need it.

Lo and behold, next pull, wipe. Guess who pulled agro? Yes! The kid that can't even see PG13 movies! Awesome sauce. The tension built as did my volume on Vent. Then I saw it. 4753... HP... on a 70 warlock. "Rath is your gear all red?" (Yes) "You do know that when it's red you get no stats... you're basically naked to us" (Yes) Angry silence. Call the whambulance, because here it comes "It's because I haven't gotten any greens today, I don't have any money..." I interject "You DO know that a single quest gives you 11g, right?" He cowers in silence. "You DO realize that there's a repair guy right next to where we rez, right?" We wipe, again, the shammy Ahnks up. The shaman actually trades off a handful of greens for him to make his monies. I get fed up and /trade 25g. Since our shaman is having a hard time, I just tell everyone to help out and bandage... and then he does it again. "I can't bandage"

"Excuse me?"

"Yeah I've tried it a million times and I can't get the quest"

"So what's your First Aid at?"

"225"

*snaps* "The triage quest is a level 35 quest that's in arathi highands, at hammerfall for you to save patients to increase your first aid limit to 300. It's not THAT hard"

"Well I can't get the quest"

"Ok just drop it. You can still get consumables, pots, waters, and food?"

(you guessed it) "I don't have any"

The tank first easily first aids the lock, since he can heal for approx 75% of his health. "Alright we busted an ahnk, what's the cooldown on a soulstone".... "I don't have a shard yet" I throw down my headset "WHAT THE F***!" /r WORTHLESS! I bolt for more Dr. P.

Next pull, we wipe, I repair, I show nubcake where to repair. 11g double's his health. Although the mage leaves, we start to do fine.

We eventually get the key fragment with a final hurrah kamikaze/chain kiting/you-taunt-I-get-the-frag-I-taunt-you-get-the-frag scheme. I leave group. I mute nubcakes, leave the channel. I contemplate ignoring him. I hearth to shat. Rath invites me to group. I accept and say "follow me" taking the portal to UC. I fly to Hammerfall. I stand next to the NPC. He gets there and says "wtf I can get it now lol"

/exit

No threat meter, no first aid, no gold, low durability, no consumables, no shards, such is the wrath of Rath.

DM. · Post by **DM.** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 10:45 am

lol RP?

Eyeball-Dragonmaw · Post by **Eyeball-Dragonmaw** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 10:45 am

The exact reasons I don't PvE, and only PvP.

Hybuir · Post by **Hybuir** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 10:50 am

DM. wrote:lol RP?

Detailed rant, I guess

Balgair · Post by **Balgair** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 3:53 pm

Lol gotta love noobs. Although I had no threat meter until recently, don't like them, frankly I consider them an exploit. Had to admit defeat and install one on my lock after pulling aggro too many times, but I refuse to on any other character - if I can't manage aggro on my rogue or priest without I seriously need to l2play, and so does anyone else who insists they're essential for everyone

Skyfire · Post by **Skyfire** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 11:55 pm

I don't know why KTM or another would be required... (What's so different at 70?

) but the rest of it... ew.

But then, having a group of 4 DPS (1 tank) and 1 healer didn't exactly help.

xpolockx · Post by **xpolockx** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 6:07 am

KTM is very very helpful for tanks especially on fights like Grull, where for instance the offtank has to remain exactly 2nd on threat among melee characters to eat the strikes. For most people I don't think it's all that necessary if you know what you're doing... but most (not all, but definitely the majority of) raiding guilds have required KTM since BWL days

On my hunter I had it because I was required to, but rarely ever had it visible, since Feign Death made it so I pretty much never had to worry about threat. On some fights KTM isn't even that accurate, so it's not like it's a failsafe mechanism anyway

On track of the post, I feel ya Hyb... some groups just end up like that. You win some, you lose some

Hybuir · Post by **Hybuir** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 9:42 am

Balgair wrote: Although I had no threat meter until recently, don't like them, frankly I consider them an exploit. Had to admit defeat and install one on my lock after pulling aggro too many times, but I refuse to on any other character - if I can't manage aggro on my rogue or priest without I seriously need to l2play, and so does anyone else who insists they're essential for everyone

Skyfire wrote:I don't know why KTM or another would be required... (What's so different at 70? )

Erm... WHAT? KTM/Omen is essential in end game raiding. Everyone is set to do their job at their max, DPS'ers DPS, Healers heal, tanks generate threat, Trolls /dance, but by being maximumly efficient at what you do, you also run VERY high threat. As for them being considered an exploit, no. It's a tool used to guage the mechanics that Blizz has helped developed by explaining threat values and formulas. It lets you know how far you can push your contribution without hindering the encounter.

Balgair · Post by **Balgair** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 9:59 am

Essential for raiding perhaps but you're talking about Arcatraz. Not needed at all in 5-mans, and not really in 10-mans, imo - I've done Kara without threat meters with no problems on both rogue and priest. I still consider it an exploit though; would much prefer if they didn't exist as frankly avoiding aggro should be down to skill, not watching bars in the corner of the screen... it's pathetic that it's necessary to do that, but unfortunately so many insist on them that there's no other option half the time.

Hybuir · Post by **Hybuir** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 2:18 pm

does a football team do anything different in an exibition game? no. take every game as if it were the superbowl. 100% 100% of the time. Same with 5 mans, imo. The only thing that I dont do while farming is use pots or elixers, everything else is the same... that's just my opinion I could be wrong.

Skyfire · Post by **Skyfire** » Wed Oct 17, 2007 1:31 am

Balgair wrote:Essential for raiding perhaps but you're talking about Arcatraz. Not needed at all in 5-mans, and not really in 10-mans, imo - I've done Kara without threat meters with no problems on both rogue and priest. I still consider it an exploit though; would much prefer if they didn't exist as frankly avoiding aggro should be down to skill, not watching bars in the corner of the screen... it's pathetic that it's necessary to do that, but unfortunately so many insist on them that there's no other option half the time.

Bingo.

You're doing a five man. Not a twenty-five man. I understand that KTM has been required since the days of BWL (didn't even need it in that instance

), but that's a different story. If people can't figure their shit out, that just means they need to l2p.

Phreeze · Post by **Phreeze** » Wed Oct 17, 2007 3:01 am

muahhaaha

love my 12k HP on my WL

6k HP = lvl 60....noob...

DM. · Post by **DM.** » Wed Oct 17, 2007 8:00 am

KTM/Omen is nice to have in 5mans, esp if your someone like me who is normally way over geared than their main tank. On some boss fights I can't use anything but Scorch because a couple of Fireballs will cause me to pull agro

Phreeze · Post by **Phreeze** » Thu Oct 18, 2007 5:11 am

you could do what you do best: water, sheep and portals

Balgair · Post by **Balgair** » Thu Oct 18, 2007 4:03 pm

Yep I saw the Blizzcon thing, it was only after that that I even considered getting Omen, but I still don't like the concept at all. I use it because I get yelled at for pulling aggro if I don't (on my lock, which I fully admit I'm not too skilled with yet; I don't use it on any other character), but frankly I'd much rather everyone was on an equal playing field with not having them and learning to use skill to avoid pulling aggro. Having run some groups with Omen on my lock now it's easymode, just watch the bars instead of actually thinking about what I'm doing, yawn.

Post by **Rollie** » Fri Oct 19, 2007 9:51 am

You have to have some sort of feedback with regards to threat, otherwise every new encounter, every new tank, you can either slack off and make sure you don't pull aggro, or you'll have to 'test the waters' and pull aggro a few times before you know how far you can push before you get aggro.

All tanks are not created equal. A lot of it is gear dependent, but moreso it is skill dependent. Sure, if you do the same instances with the same groups on a regular basis, you should know pretty well what you can get away with, but outside of that, you gotta have some sort of feedback if you want to perform to your maximum potential.

Not to mention that some encounters change up the way threat works, and some require certain people to be at certain positions. If AI could advance to the point where it was just 'smarter' in general then things would be much different, and likely much more like what you see in 5v5 arenas.

Things would go for the people who were perceived as the most dangerous, not just based on some number.

Until that time, it's just another mechanic. And you have to have some sort of feedback for said mechanic. There is no in game feedback other than, oops, I pulled aggro and (in some circumstances, particularly raids and heroics), I may have just wiped the group. Since there is no feedback system, you have to use threat meters, or relegate yourself to sub-optimal performance.

Hybuir · Post by **Hybuir** » Fri Oct 19, 2007 11:32 am

That's just the thing, PvE should be easymode, everythings mechanical. If you want a challenge, pve, havoc everywhere.

You may pull agro and learn from it, MOST DON'T! Testing the water is not the same as "pew pew zomg, wtf, healz? im dead, gg" which was the same ol story with this guy

makes me want to go into AV, grab a bunch of copies of "peeling the onion" and flood his mail with it.