I spend a lot of time thinking about things. I over think things, and I like to analyze situations, and people’s behavior. The mind is a strange and fascinating thing. We are all different and react differently to other people’s behavior. When you then throw together people from all over the world online, playing the same game, you will have conflict. It is unavoidable. In ddo I do a lot of pugging, playing with strangers, and people who are no longer strangers as we keep running into each other over and over again. Some have even become friends. The age of the people I play with vary between 15 and 40+, and they are from all over the world and different cultures.
I consider manners and a bit of tolerance to be important. Show good manners, but tolerate a bit of less good manners from others, and you’ll get a long with the majority of people. When I first started playing, I considered some behavior to be rude, now I accept it as I’ve gotten used to it. I try to lead by example and behave in the way I want my co gamers to behave. For example, always say thank you after a run, leave group before logging off if you have to go, and such. Note, I said try. No one is flawless and I am sure I on occasion fail to follow my own rules. Everyone has bad days.
Now, who am I as a player, and why am I so addicted to this game? What is it that drives me? Thinking back on growing up, I can see the same characteristics that I currently show in game as well. I am goal driven and I want to succeed. I am also social (online specifically) and I enjoy talking to people. After having played this game for 2 years now, and half or more of it running raids, I have learned what I like and don’t like. I like semi-fast smooth runs with people who know what they’re doing and listen to and follow leader’s chosen tactics. I hate it when you have some idiot in your group who either thinks they know better than than everyone else and starts giving contradicting orders, or someone who doesn’t listen and does opposite to chosen tactics. I like doing my own lfm’s, or joining groups that I know and trust. I don’t like wasting time in groups that don’t have what it takes to complete the task at hand, or at least not in any decent amount of time.
For a moment I was a bit worried that I had developed a bad habit of ordering people around, even in other’s raids, but then it hit me. My problem is not that have to be in charge, my problem is with playing healer. I learned to play this game from the healer side, which is both good an bad. I was never declined from groups, as people always want healers, and I started taking charge, just to keep people alive. I cannot heal through walls, and when you reach epics/ epic elites, I cannot keep spot healing people in a group either, just because I do not switch target fast enough. It takes a player 2 seconds to die in epic elites, when getting hit straight on, it takes me as long to target them, while only 1 second to hit heal/cure/bursts. So, if I can just cast a mass cure from my current target, the player will live, if I have to switch, they will die (in a situation when a non self healing/ non kiting melee is getting hit straight on). And, if they die, I will get the blame. So, to avoid getting blamed for failing to heal people, I started ordering them to stay in heal range so I could do my job properly, as well as demanding that they play smart to save me mana. People don’t really reimburse me for my efforts either, so I’ve had to make the play field my own. The good thing about playing a healer is that you’re constantly looking at the party’s hp bars, even if not on your healer, and can spot problems early.
Now, this spring I ED farmed on Thaz to get her primal avatar epic moment, the tree. Then I started practicing doing dps in epic elites, while healing myself. I was suddenly no longer the party healer, but the main dps in many quests, and I was really enjoying it. I was enjoying having a toon that could do a lot of dps, but still heal herself quickly and had all the self buffs she needed if she died. I mean, I still die a lot when doing tree in epic elites, but I’ve gotten better at it. I also started doing StormReaver tank in FoT, and got better at it after some advice from a friend “only wear plis for boom, to save charges”. I realized that I’m currently very unhappy in the role of party healer, and I prefer byoh groups a lot more. I look out for myself, and I wish others would too (look out for themselves). With the ed’s, it’s not even difficult anymore to have self healing.
I enjoy end game content, I love running raids. I want to improve as a player, and I want to help others succeed in their tasks as well. It gives me a happy when my efforts pay off, and we as a group succeed. I am a team player, but I want us to be equals, I want everyone to make an effort, and to come prepared to quests/ raids. I have nothing against new people, or people wanting to learn new roles. I will gladly share what I’ve learned, or how I usually do things, as long as the other is open to it. I will, though, fight for my say, if someone is making opposing claims without a proper explanation. I do not claim to be right all the time, I base my say on what I’ve seen. If you know better, explain it in a way that makes sense and I’ll listen.
Alright, thank you for reading and have a wonderful week. 🙂
P.S. Omg! I’m so arrogant! XD lol
Micki's Delirium 
BYOH is as you’ve pointed out quite easy now in the Epic Destiny system and some of those are just tier 1 items that are really easy to twist in. Get 4 or 5 people with healing spring from Shiradi, have Fast Healing from Fury twisted in and its amazing how little healing the clerics really need to do.
Well said.
We talked about this yesterday with friends in one of the channels, days when ddo needed helaer, tank etc to acomplish quests are over, healers are needed and will be needed in raids etc but its sad that healbot (healer that only can heal and nothing more) is a waste of party slot in ee. 3 top builds in ddo right now (jugger, monkcher, shiradi) are self healing mega dps types. Its matter of desing, they want that want make all quests soloable. I wish that some day ddo will go back to former glory, with need of team play, with respect for healing toons etc, now its like one of good friends said ,,byoh, dps or gtfo,,
🙂 tbh, I’ve always considered the healbot to be a waste of space in any party. I’ve always said a healer should be able to heal + do secondary dps. I specced Thaz as caster, but I’ve always melee’d too, even in the old epics. We had awesome cc, so I didnt need to heal much, so I was meleing a bit on the side. At lvl 20 I used to dp bosses while healing the melees, then I switched to melee + dp + heals. The only time I found healbotting fun, was when the melees were fighting a boss that hit so hard, that u could only let them get hit once before healing, or they’d die, like it was my first time in Reclaiming the Rift ee.
I have to agree with Wey. DDO is based on D&D and I’ve always thought D&D was about team play. Maybe I’m a traditionalist, but I like the idea of a party that is balanced and helping each other out. And I think the introduction of overpowered builds that we now see in game takes a lot of the fun out of it. Sure, it’s great the first few times you run something solo/short manned and just blitz through it no problem.
But where’s the challenge? Where’s the sense of achievement?
I hope Turbine re-balances things.
“I’ve always thought D&D was about team play” well.. unless the party decide to try and kill each other 😛
🙂 Are you telling me, you support one trick ponies? A rogue should only do traps, a barb should only beat stuff up, a wizard should only do cc, a sorc should only dps, etc?
Of course, I don’t know D&D. But I think pikers are a waste of space, a rogue that can do nothing but traps, a bard that only sings, etc.
And yes, I am taking this personally. I’ve always hated pugs telling me “you’re a healer, you should stand back and heal”. No. I’m a cleric. A cleric is a very versatile class, that’s why I like it so much. I can heal, it may be be the thing I do best. But it’s not all I am. It’s almost the same as saying a blond girl can’t be smart too.
And yes, I realize I’m the person who’ll say “you’re a healer, you’re expected to heal”. But, I don’t want that to be all they are. Heals are not constantly needed, neither is cc or trappers. One trick ponies will spend time piking, and I don’t support that.
I love my cleric, but if the game changes to force clerics to be healbots only, I’ll have to stop playing her, and I really don’t want that.
No I’m not saying that at all. I don’t think any class is a “one trick pony”. And considering how much damage the rogues I play with do, while being able to handle all high level traps, doors etc helps to prove that. The same with clerics. I agree they have the potential to do major damage. But tree? No, I think that takes away from the spirit of the game.
🙂 Well, if you oppose tree, you should oppose Shiradi and LD epic moments too. They beat the tree by miles.
maybe I do 😀
It’s cause all those epic desinies or whatever that thingy is called has nothing to do with D&D, exept that some of their names resemble prestige classes from it, but their power level and skills they give players aren’t very D&D – like.
“I don’t like wasting time in groups that don’t have what it takes to complete the task at hand, or at least not in any decent amount of time.”
This made my day lol.
Most of your groups can be described as the above. All those 3 – 4 hours Tors and Crucibles on LFM ❤
🙂 I did one ee tor that took 3h. because, my cleric cant solo ee tor, and I was the only one in the group with ee dps.
and ee crucible? if u haven’t noticed, I have a tendency to start solo, and as I cant solo, I end up having to wait for a bit of help.
It took me 45 min to get half way through ee detour solo, took us only like 15 min more to complete, after my friend joined me to help.
after having run a lot with ppl who are not ee dps, I am tired of it, and have been getting more selective.
I stand by what I said, I dont like running with those groups that take that long. If I get the right ppl for my group, it wont. But Im not always that lucky. Still, if u’ve paid any attention to what I’ve been doing, u’d know ee crucible has always been a success and completed in decent time. and I pug. takes me 15 min to do the maze, and we usually finish ee, in the same time a pug would do he.
ask around. ask the ppl who’ve been running ee with me. unless u have, im sorry, but u’re sort of talking out of ur ass. 🙂
🙂 I am going to guess, Jerk = Xris. U know. July, I played 40h+/week. I farmed ee’s, doing multiple runs in a row lf the quest I was doing, ransacking at least tor and pop, but we did most of the others as well. saying that most of my groups take 3-4 h, would be like saying that you normally wipe in fot. 🙂
also, while I spent the summer farming ee’s any chance i got (also doing raids and levelling my alts), I did not see Xris play much at all, and he missed many of the scheduled guild raids.
Stop guessing, you are as bad as with questing/raiding at it.
🙂 So, tell me who you are, and stop being chicken.
P.S. That was horrible English from you.
Btw. I checked your ip. The only Polish person I know to dislike me, is Shataan. But why Shataan would waste his time trolling a little girl’s blog, is beyond me.
You just bein a Jerk, Jerk 🙂 Very untrue about crucible again i say that Thaz is one of best ppl to do ee crucible, me, her and one other friend and done in 20 top 30 minutes if i go afk to smoke (and i do it a lot :D)
Haven’t I told you that you are horrible at guessing ? Trust me, there are more people that dislike you than you could imagine.