Quote Originally Posted by Awha View Post
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I have been in quite a few instances with undergeared tanks and healers. In the ones where they have outright apologized for their poor gear a la something like “I just returned to the game after a couple months absence”, “I just started playing a few days ago and didn’t know I could get better gear from vendors/the MB”, or “I know my gear is really poor but I’m going to try my best; if it’s not enough/too slow then feel free to replace me if you guys want a cleaner/faster run”, groups have been extremely willing to help out said person, adjusting to accommodate them. However, when a person doesn’t speak up about their poor gear, tries to do far too much for them to handle multiple times (i.e., poorly geared tank tries for larger pulls, dies, respawns, and just does the same thing again—bonus points if they acknowledge their gear is crap), people are far less willing to accommodate, and far more likely to resort to “majority rules” in the form of vote dismissal. Communication is key.

Certainly people should not expect other people to cater to them—and I know that there are players out there that do not expect that, but there are an equal amount out there that do.

Personally speaking, I will not enter a duty unless I have appropriate gear for it, and that probably comes from my experience as a healer having to heal overly enthusiastic undergeared tanks on more occasions than I would like to count. A good example is I am leveling up NIN right now, which was still in the 230 gear from Weeping City (tells you how often I played that job after it hit 60 lol). I farmed up some poetics to buy the job 260 Shire gear, and even augmented it before opting to join roulettes where I may get a duty I am not geared to handle. Same thing when I leveled DRK—she was in full 270, and I didn’t get much gear from her after Shisui, so I stuck to just doing Alliance Roulette so as to not burden a healer in Bardam’s Mettle or Doma Castle with poor gear. However, not everyone has that kind of foresight nor consideration. Only in a perfect world would such happen, and this world is anything but that. I try not to expect people to have the same kind of behavior or consideration as myself, though it would be nice.