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

[Michieltjuhh]

Expert roulette of the day, going in as SGE because I know I'll have to carry some special people as usual, get Dead Ends. I generally "force" double pulls on my tanks no matter how special they are because I'm usually good enough to handle it. Nothing different here for the majority of the run. I tank 50% of the packs, because the tank hasn't opened his Actions & Traits since ARR, but I deal with it. The dps aren't much different - every pack is taking about 3x as long as they should, so it felt like I was practically solo'ing them at that point by being the tank, dps and healer all in one, but that's what SGE is made for. Whatever, happens, bad players need to be allowed to play too. Bosses get to a part of their rotation that I've never seen before and I had to Esuna a plethora of times but it's nothing I can't carry. Probably top dps there while at it. Eventually, though, we get to the pull after second boss. Historically one of the tougher ones to do with a braindead tank, but I've not failed it before.

I did this time. I was tanking every single mob, despite using Icarus back to the tank after activating the mobs, and popped heals on myself slightly too late so snapshotting got the better of me. The RDM raised me up (wow, he actually had at least one button on his bars then) and I instantly notice the pack taking about 10x as long rather than 3x as long because the only person pressing damage buttons was now stuck in a healing loop with limited tools for it, low mana, and a Weakness. We (I) manage, thankfully, and I apologize for messing up. Regardless of all 3 of them having room temperature IQ, I'm still the one forcing them into a wall to wall pull, and I should only be allowed to do that as healer if I'm actually dealing with it which I didn't this time.

Well, that's until the next double pack, where the tank decides to double pull anyway despite me not doing it because I still had Weakness, still had low mana, and still had fuck all CDs ready. I somehow manage to keep this vegetable punching bag alive and after what felt like a decade we clear it and go to the last boss. Managed to carry that without issue again since the SGE machine was back in working order.

Proceed to give them a "Cheers" despite them making that dungeon take twice as long as it should have, wait for the loot to be rolled out and leave. Icing on the cake: not a single commendation.

[tinythinker]

He will always focus on the first person to slap him, it's normal.

Oh sure, I was just surprised spamming stone 2 could hold aggro when a tank tries to grab it

[Rannie]

I had a nice, smooth run of World of Darkness today. Not a single wipe!

Was that a dream it doesn't seem possible

[MilkieTea]

Alliance Raid Roulette

I manage to queue into a Nier raid. Instantly I get the vibe that the raid would take longer than it'd take to just eat the 30 min penalty, but I decide to plod on because what the heck, y'know. Got an accidental surprise in the form of an FC mate to share in my miseries with, so there's that.

We do pretty much fine? Until we hit Engel and one of the tanks decides to deliberately plop himself on top of a bunch of us and kill us with his tank buster.

And later on we wipe to the 2nd 9s add phase bc the tanks didnt listen when we said to separate the adds and we hit an enrage (that I didn't even know existed)

Lasted way longer than it should've imho.

[Jettinson]

Had an Eden Ramuh fight where the Sage put Kardia on the OT for the rest of the fight while i was MT, i never died aside being forced to wipe when both healer were dead but I kinda wonder what the person was thinking on healing someone constantly at full health and a tank...

[Packetdancer]

I love it when you both have the Aoe and you're trying to get away from the other person and they keep following you and kill you...

To be fair, they often see you following them on their screen because of the way networking works in this game. It's not instantaneous to remote players.

While that's a readily-apparent limitation of network gaming to folks who've worked in the industry, I still got to see this in action directly when a friend and I nailed each other with AoEs a few weeks ago and happened to both be streaming at the time; on his stream, you could see that I was following him very slightly behind, while on mine he was just slightly behind following me. We just each chose to head for the same safe spot simultaneously.

(Doesn't make it any less frustrating when it happens, though...)

[Windfire]

Bit different run : I did Smileton for the first (and will be ONLY) time, I was so ill by the end of the run I had to lie down. First time XIV had made me motion sick, not a good time.

[NanaWiloh]

Dear tanks who do wall to wall pulls in EW 4 mans and don't use Def cd's. My gravity does not have a stun effect as I am AST not WHM, So if you want me to Aoe more then you may want to consider using your Def cd's. It is highly annoying when I have Stal,CI and ED all cool down before the trash pack is even dead cause your HP is dropping at warp speed.

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

Had a handful bad runs past few days but let's start with the one I just cleared few minutes prior to start writing this post: Great Gubal Library (Hard)

Commences the roulette as a SCH, paired with a GNB, RDM, & BLM. Usual greeting etc, there's also 1 new player, I suspect it was the BLM since they were watching cutscene.

GNB:"I'm new to tanking."
Me:"Usual business~"

Then we wiped after barely killing 2 or 3 mobs from the first wall pull. "Uhh what...? Okay nevermind, that was probably my fault. I'll apologize."
I encouraged the tank to not be afraid of wall pulling again. I even promised them that I won't let it happen again. Second wall pull? They died again. Although we did not wipe this time, I had to kite and tank the remaining alive mobs. Lots and lots of lustrates were thrown. We made it, of course with the GNB still kissing the floor.

GNB:"What can I do to help healing? Do I have any skill to help healing?"

To myself behind this monitor: "Oh dear... one of those who never read their tooltip."

Then again... today specifically I have ounces of patience to last. I ended up giving this GNB a small, crash course to tank dungeons in general. Including their defensive buttons such as Rampart, Camo, and Nebula without spending too much times... While I'm doing this, suddenly something looks amiss when I peered onto their HP and...

Me behind monitor:"Oh, for the love of that's almighty and limitless grace... Oh... my... GOD!!! HOW???!!!"

BLM:"Thank you for being patient with him, Reiner :-)"
Me:"Np. However it'd be wise to check & keep your gears updated. They bear the most significance to tanks especially in dungeons."

Please... I hope they get the message... and not in bad way...
Out of curiosity I viewed all of their search info. All of them came from the same world... oh dear... are these group of friends queing together...?

After first boss they sort of chickened a bit and just stick to small pull. No problemo.
After second boss for some reason they decided to sprint ahead. I thought they probably gained some confidence in tanking? Great, but... whatever, let's wing it. I have 3 AF and Dissipation ready.

Indeed, last wall pull was spicy as heck. Aggro was ping-pong'ing: half of the mobs were orange, yellow, or worse red aggro against myself. But we pulled through.

Onward we go to third boss, then my fear was confirmed: none of them knows how to handle the mech and GNB already facepulled the owl. RDM was the only one who tried their best to mimic my movement but they failed few times. The other two consistently failing.

Fast-forward, Owl still had about 30% HP when the Behemoth Meteor resolves. Boss turns everybody into an imp. I resolved my own debuff. But other three were zapped to death. Yes, it was a clean triple kill.

Do I wipe it? Do I persevere? I eyeballed my resources UI
"Three AF stacks... Aetherflow coming off cooldown in 15s... Dissipation ready.... Goddamnit! Let's do it!!!"

Swiftraise the GNB, of course they didn't provoke the owl. I had to slide Broil/Ruin II with some Adlos and Lustrates persevere. I'm actually buying time for the GNB to take back the aggro. By the time next swift was up, Owl was down to... probably sub 10%. I raised the RDM. Only -now- the GNB succeeded taking back the aggro. Sorry BLM, but I decided to just burn the boss at that point.

Victory fanfare!

GNB:"Well that wasn't bad, I guess."
Me in game:"Alright tyfp. Remember to keep your gears updated. Take care." -leaves-
Me behind monitor:"No...dear GNB... It was -not- okay... Please, I hope you take in my advice... however terrible your tanking is, at the very least, update those gears... what's that glam head piece doing there anyways...?!

Three commendations... my thanks...
I... need a drink...

/playdead
/reallydead

[Kolsykol]

Tbh I would've left, imo staying with people like that is kinda enabling them.
If you can't even bother to buy some basic grey gear and you run in with gear that doesn't even have stats on them ( his head and gloves ) then you don't respect anyone else in the group so why should I respect you enough to stay?
I am just doing this in the future too in Savage if I inspect people and see that they have zero melds or cheap low ilvl melds, nah after my experience this past week I am just out then.

On a personal level I don't even understand these people, there are other people involved too it's just common sense to put a base level of effort in.
If I am missing melds and don't have the gil or crystals to buy them then well guess I won't be raiding that night.
If I was in this tank scenario I'd keep questing/ play my max level Jobs until I had the gil or tomestones to buy gear.