Hi All,

 

I've seen a large amount of new players recently joining PUG groups, making a complete fool of themselves, and then finding out that they have now been put on ignore by the larger raiding community. Ever find that the groups in Allies chat never respond to you? You've probably been blacklisted. Yes, the larger, more competent, guilds do keep a "Do Not PUG" list for those...unsavory...players. Below you will find a list of "hints" to help you not be "that guy", and ruin your experience. These are universal principles, and are considered standard. Some groups may do things differently, which is A-Okay!

 

It should be stated, that this applies to SM PUG's. HM/NiM is an entirely different beast, and hopefully if you are doing that you have some concept of what you are getting into.

 

- If joining a PUG group and you have no experience with that particular OP, you need to make that known. Some raid leads don't have the patience or time to babysit a new player. Don't be offended! YOu will find a group that is willing to train you...or better yet, JOIN A GUILD!

 

- The Tank(s) are the defacto Group Lead if it is not a majority guild run. Tanks are responsible for pulling, therefore it's important that they have at least LT so they can Ready Check and use OPS ANNOUNCEMENT as necessary. When I tank and a dps pulls, I usually let them have it for a good while.

 

- OPS ANNOUNCEMNT is not the place for chatting. Don't be surprised if you get booted for over using it when not necessary.

 

- Standard Operation Frame Layout is 2 columns, with tanks at the top of each column, and healers at the bottom. This holds true for 8 or 16 man. This makes it much easier to split the raid when there are multiple bosses.

 

- Know your class. It's not necessary to have a great rotation or be Min/Maxed on gear, but you should understand the fundamentals of what you are playing. I swear, if I see one more Vanguard at the back of the pack pew-pewing Titan 6 saying "but I have a gun, I'm a ranged class" I'm going to lose it. (True Story).

 

Be the proper spec you say you are: For instance, don't say you're a healer and come in as a Lightning Sorcerer.

 

The next few are for people forming raids:

 

- If you are forming an OP and someone joins, and then states they forgot gear on an ALT and are swapping quickly to grab it, DO NOT fill their position. Give them a reasonable time to flip over and send it over. This is a big one that lands people on the No Pug list. Entire groups even.

 

- Requirements for PUG Ops are active subscription and min lv 70. Aside from NoP (Must be lv 75), ops get scaled to lv 70 anyhow. Don't knock someone joining at lv 70 - it's good experience. Min lv used to be 50, when healer classes and tanks barely had enough abilities to cope.

 

- If you are forming a PUG group, you should know the operation. If you don't, A) you really have no business forming it, and B) You should indicate as much, stating that it is a training run.

 

This short list brought to you from my years of running OPs and instructing new players. It's scary to think that I have been playing since 2012...yikes.

 

Hope this helps

 

Q

 

The next few are for people forming raids:

 

- If you are forming an OP and someone joins, and then states they forgot gear on an ALT and are swapping quickly to grab it, DO NOT fill their position. Give them a reasonable time to flip over and send it over. This is a big one that lands people on the No Pug list. Entire groups even.

 

This seems pretty unreasonable to me. Sure, if it's a guild run, expect people to wait for you, provided your guild isn't a really driven progression group with people on waiting lists for Ops slots. If you're joining someone else's PUG though, HAVE YOUR ACT TOGETHER BEFORE YOU ASK FOR THE INVITE! A specialization/combat style swap is fine if you have the field respec. perk unlocked. Needing to log and get a re-invite, or extended travel to fleet to grab a respec, really is not. PUGs often take forever and a day to put together, and if you make everyone else wait even longer because you don't even have gear on your character, you richly deserve to be booted from the Op. Probably not blacklisted though. After all, if you're noobing it up that hard, it's probably just lack of experience right? Not callous disregard for common courtesy to other players.

 

- Requirements for PUG Ops are active subscription and min lv 70. Aside from NoP (Must be lv 75), ops get scaled to lv 70 anyhow. Don't knock someone joining at lv 70 - it's good experience. Min lv used to be 50, when healer classes and tanks barely had enough abilities to cope.

 

At 50 classes had all the tools they needed for Ops. Or they did, until Bioware for 4 expansions in a row gave players, "Powerful new max level abilities," by taking away the top tier spec defining ability (or two) and then giving it back at the new level cap. With 7.0, well, let's just say that if you used to level by doing HM FPs a lot, you should probably come up with a new game plan for alts, especially if in heal or tank specs. For SM ops though, yeah, it won't matter.

You misunderstand. Entire guilds will put a person on legacy ignore for booting someone because they didn't want to wait on them to grab gear quick. Not the person who got booted. I get feeling differently, but that is irrelevant here, because this is what happens in many cases. If you were around before all gear was legacy bound, you'd understand the absolute pain it was. Maybe you are on a more quiet server, but on SF when you see an a PUG forming, 9/10 it forms really quickly, and if you don't get in and claim your spot, you miss out. It is however important to read that I said a reasonable amount of time... you can spare an extra min to allow someone to get their gear, especially in the current game where everyone has a dozen alts. But sure, if they take too long, yeah fill the spot, no one will belittle you for it. Edited January 22, 2022 by NickEmory