Tales from Duty Finder: Some make you laugh, some make you cry. Let's vent.

[Texa]

Why does EVERYONE flub the Sophia mechanic in Fractal Hard?

People do the exact same thing in Sophia normal too, which I used to run a lot just because I felt like it. The mechanic IS pretty confusing to see just out of the blue they probably thing it's like a burst aoe or something that they need to be by themselves for. Your options there are to let them eat it, make a macro to explain it while its happening, explain it during the pull before the boss, or rescue someone into yours if you're healing.

[Moomba33]

Yup. Plus the mechanic isn't punishing when failed in Normal so average players never have a reason to learn what you're supposed to do.

[ChloeGrace]

60 minute Hell's Lid.
The RDM never cast a single spell. Ever. Just TP moves.
At one point, me, the tank and healer were all running on empty, tactician and refresh were on cooldown. Was there a mana shift? Vercure? Even a jolt? Nope.
So sick of carrying lazy people. At 70, there's no excuse for play that bad.

[ViolaCrossfire]

60 minute Hell's Lid.
The RDM never cast a single spell. Ever. Just TP moves.
At one point, me, the tank and healer were all running on empty, tactician and refresh were on cooldown. Was there a mana shift? Vercure? Even a jolt? Nope.
So sick of carrying lazy people. At 70, there's no excuse for play that bad.

Use the votekick feature earlier then.

[Miste]

If he would have asked, instead of just assumed, I'm sure that duty would have gone very differently.

The tank in that story did state what he was planning to do and I am not defending his way of going about it... he should have waited a bit longer for a response, but in the end it still takes two people to communicate either way.

If any of them in the group had a problem with how the tank was playing they can speak up and ask for what they want. Yes, you can't stop the initial big pull, but Ala Mhigo specifically has walls that need to be blown up which takes a little bit once all mobs are dead. There would have been ample time for any of them to type "wait" after even the first pull and try to explain what they want.

If the tank ignored them after that then it is 100% on the tank since he isn't listening to them, but honestly people have to stop this thing where they expect people to know what they want without speaking up.

No one can help you if you don't tell them what you want. No one can tell if you are personally stressed unless you say so.

the OP was well within her right to leave. It was, in fact, a lot nicer than what I would have done which is let the tank eat floor until they A) got a clue or B) tried to kick me.

Yes, the OP was well within her right to leave, but she came here posting a rant about someone doing something she didn't like yet stayed silent and didn't bother to communicate her desires.

There was time; OP just didn't use it. There are two walls in the beginning of Ala Mhigo that need to blow up before the first boss alone that leaves the party sitting there for a bit waiting each time...WAY more than enough time to type "wait a second" or even simply "wait".

If the tank ignored OP still then yes it is on him for not stopping to listen, but OP didn't even try according to her post.

So yeah I am sorry, but the whole thing turns into: "They couldn't read my mind that these pulls were too stressful for me so I am going to just say nothing and leave group then go to forums and then rant how this tank didn't do what I wanted....even though I didn't even attempt to tell them what I wanted."

Your approach is even more ridiculous. Instead of communicating what you want you'll just purposefully let the tank die or wait for them to kick you? lol I'm sorry but you need to learn to ask people for what you want, not just throw passive aggressive tantrums.

Not everyone is going to ask you or others every time they load in to DF "How can I serve you today?" They are regular MMO gamers, not Burger King staff...so if you want something from someone whose whole purpose in DF isn't just to serve your needs then you have to use words and make a request of them. How they respond is what you should use to judge if they are a respectful individual.

[ChloeGrace]

Use the votekick feature earlier then.

You can't when they bring a friend and you lose the popularity contest.

[Kakiko]

Long rantish thing:

Just got out of Hell's Lid. I've only done it maybe 3 times. My sister, WHM only, was doing it for her first time. She'd watched a video and I was trying to help her with the mechanics but since I've only done it 3 times myself, they're still a bit hazy. Get a WAR tank and tell them right off the bat that it's the healer's first time. First pull was easy, drop down into that square room, no big deal. Firey hallway was fine. Sadly, sis died on first boss but SAM, myself, and WAR managed to hold on and down it. After that the pulls got bigger and tank was double pulling (and at one point after the second boss, a triple pull). I kept ripping hate off the tank despite using Lucid Dreaming and Diversion when possible. Tank dies, and then we wipe. Try again, single pull now. Ok good. Everything's fine leading up to the last boss. Tank does a single pull, then a double, I LB, goes smooth. Last two pieces of trash down quickly and onto the last boss.

Here's where it gets not so fun. I've only done this maybe 3 times myself and the water ball mechanic thing is still a bit hazy to me so I try to stay on the middle tile because that seems to be the safer one more often than not. I try to explain the mechanic as best I can (not very well), SAM confirms, WAR says nothing. We go in and within a minute or so, WHM is dead. I didn't see how she died but there she was. We held on a bit more but eventually I died (too many stacks b/c again, I'm not super good with the mechanic yet either and no healing) and then SAM and WAR died. WHM asks a question about how to avoid the water, and gets "watch the tiles" as a reply. We try again, this time WAR tells WHM to stick with them (and marks themselves). WHM does, WHM dies. Again I think probably due to stacks. Third time, WAR says "ok you need to stop dying to that." No explanation of what "that" is, no other help beyond that. Obviously we were having a bit of trouble. WHM apologizes, I'm biting my tongue because as much as I want to stick up for my sister, she's an adult and she can stick up for herself and I don't want to look like I'm "protecting" her. We manage to get through and as soon as the fight's over, WAR high tails it out.

Yes, it took us longer than a normal run does. I get that. No, we weren't perfect and yes I was messing up (and trying not to) too. But, I feel like we did the best we could. WHM watched a video before hand. Explained that she was new up front. Was obviously trying. She asked a question about something that was confusing her in an effort to learn and was met with a rather watered down reply. WAR wasn't rude, but I'm sure they hated that run because of the wipes and that's understandable. I just kind of wish people would have a bit more patience, a bit more willingness to explain something when explanations are obviously going to be well received (WHM asked a question, obviously she wants help).

I don't really know what else could have been done to avoid the wipes. You can only really learn something from running it. I felt bad for my sister because she's not a terrible white mage (she's definitely grown over the past month or two) and she hates failing at something (don't we all).

I dunno, maybe I just feel all big sisterly right now.

So, if that tank is reading this: We're sorry we wiped that many times. We're trying to do better. We appreciate you sticking through to the end.

[Taika]

Doing leveling roulette as WAR, got Copperbell normal. All good, apart from the fact that I mixed it up with the Copperbell Hard in my mind... So having checked that everyone in the group is high enough level to not need any EXP from the dungeon itself, I decide to skip as much of it as I can. I (falsely) remember that the monsters in this dungeon (actually, the other one...) start deaggroing after you've pulled them far enough. So after the initial group of 3 monsters and riding the elevator to second floor, I start pulling and sprinting ahead...and I keep pulling...and I keep sprinting...until I find myself next to the boss room.

Imagine my surprise and horror when I realise none of the monsters had actually deaggro'd, and I must still have around 15 of them. I was sure we'd wipe but couldn't do anything but Berserk Overpower Overpower Overpower and so on with the little cooldowns I had available to me, and drinking the random Potion I had on my action bar. Somehow, miraculously, we got through it with everyone alive, thanks to the super sharp healer and two extremely effective DDs (luckily we had a BLM).

Afterwards couldn't really say anything but "whops sorry I thought they'd deaggro" and compliment the group for the situation well handled. I'm fairly certain the healer at least was cursing me in their mind, but at least I gave them the commendation.

[Bernkastelx]

So haven't been in a rabanastre run that only took 25 mins in forever the norm seems to be an hour which im fine with but the last one I did just sent me over the edge. Join in progress 27 mins in I'm thinking nice boy was I wrong still on the second boss. Ok no need to panic some people are new I see the bonus message this is fine. Around 30% our party has a couple of people dead and I just saw the healers swiftcast so hey rdm has full mana he is going to help rez WRONG. First seeing a rdm with full mana that far in the fight is already signaling some red flags. We ended up wiping to the sand spheres and rdm didn't rez.

So round two I watch their cast bar, we are talking the bare minimum not even being done.Occasional cast here and there. Maybe one rez out of the near 10 deaths during the fight. At this point I am thinking bot so I called them out on it and oh boy the response was just fantastic. Lets see I think the first retort was "Have you ever seen a rdm maintain full mana?". So having experience with rdm even using lucid just doing the basics you don't stay at full mana the whole time. This was met with "Just focus on your own gameplay and maybe you wouldn't play bad". I'm just sitting there dumbfounded at this point since I died several times ripping hate as smn.

At this point im just irritated and notice a mentor status next to this persons name. In rage sorry if I offended the leech (not sorry) I state "I feel sorry for other people that are force to play with a leech with a mentor status just distasteful". Met with the good old "Im blacklisting you for harassment". At this point I am just like w/e I just want to finish this raid. There were many other things going on trolls and what not but that is what stood out to me during that run. Even left with a comm so glad I wasn't the only one noticing this leech.

[SaitoHikari]

Not really a story, but a neat trick I figured out for those struggling with not ending up with tons of vuln stacks and giving your poor healer an aneurysm during the last phase of the boss fight at Hell's Lid.

If the boss is casting the knockback attack at the same time the bubble spawns, just position yourself in the center panel, between the boss and the panel where the bubble spawned. The attack will knock you back into that panel after the bubble has already gone off, meaning it's a safe zone. This is especially useful to ensure safe melee DPS uptime (and that trying to move into the first panel normally without getting hit by the exploding bubble is usually a crapshoot because of the knockback hitstun effect).

Unfortunately, I haven't figured out a surefire way to have the entire team dodge the AoE marker variation without risking stacking on top of someone else, much less actually coordinate it in a random DF party.