Blame it on the L-A-A-A-G

[Llewndyn]

Sing the above to Jamie Foxx's "Blame it on the Alcohol" for more phun!

Hi, Llewndyn here, ready to help newer players with that great equalizer, Lag. Lag comes from the ancient Greek, lagrimos, which means "he who runs in place during a battle", don't look it up, it's in print on the internet and that makes it true. It is an ancient and mystical word that has meant much the same thing throughout the centuries, and it has always sucked.

A lot of people get hit by lag, and it's an annoying but real issue in gaming online. To those people you usually offer your condolences and maybe your phone number and a picture of yourself wearing a thong if societal norms call for it, and move on. This PSA is not for those people. This PSA is for those people who take advantage of the situation, and blame lag for all of your terrible gameplay shortcomings. To those I say STOP! You are ruining it for the rest of us ActiPikers! (I am making a guild with that name, so leave it alone!)

For you newer players, here are a few ways you can tell if the player in your group is actively experiencing a problem or when they need to be kicked from the party with most haste. I put it in top 10 form because that's kind of my thing, but that makes it no less of a serious offense:

10. If you run in place for a few seconds a couple times in a mission, you have hit lag. If you stand there and we can hear you eating in the background, you are a filthy piker.

9. If your character does the heal animation and nothing happens a few times, that is because of lag. If you are running off spamming cometfall in Diplomatic Impugnity and the rest of your party dies because cometfall doesn't friggin do anything and you run huge mobs back and the BARD is the main dps in your party and we die because we were busy dealing with frikkin scorpion hordes that you rustled up and you stand there and watch with a full SP bar then blame lag then you are a complete and total failure at being a cleric. Seriously you STOOD there... there has to be SOME kind of animation of you trying to heal if you are going to blame lag, you scum! You are a terrible cleric, even worse because when you weren't burning through your SP bar totally NOT healing anyone, leaving me, the bard who is almost TOTALLY built for CC and melee to solo heal because the other "healer" is a WF fvs who was having trouble just helping mitigate what you ran back to us, you weren't raising anyone either. No I take that back you did raise a few people, myself included once, but that was after I asked 3 or 4 times while bleeding out while you ran in circles doing NOTHING.... URRRGGGHH! Wait, where was I?

8. If you fall a little behind a quick moving group once or twice, you have hit lag. If you see the party run past you TWICE in the same place in Coalescence Chamber, then you suck and are piking. It's two different things.

7. Dying because of a lag spike = OK
Dying because you are a gimp character and you ran ahead and got pwned by a clay golem and blaming lag though we saw you fighting and moving the whole time = you suck

6. If the only reason you have ever died is because of lag and you lead the group in most deaths consistently during Necro 1, it's you, baby. You are a terrible player, it has nothing to do with lag, just admit it and move on!

5. Lag only lasts a few seconds. We will know you are not lagging if you get up and go drop a deuce. Just say BIO and go. Same goes for getting a drink, smoking a cigarette, baking a cake, or drinking cold creamed corn through a straw out of a homeless man's navel (I thought it was eggnog). Doing that will only ensure when you actually DO die or fall behind due to lag that no one will believe you.

4. Blaming lag for all of your deaths while we are still WAITING TO FILL (and this has happened, no joke) means you suck, it has nothing to do with lag. Lag does NOT hit every time you go into the maze in VoN 2

3. If you are playing with any of my characters, it is always lag that kills me. Please pass me a heal. Thanks.

2. If you "lag" until the end of the mission but this oppressive stifling condition magically lifts just in time for you to loot all of the chests before FO then you are a terrible person or one of the 75% of people who answer my LFGs. Thanks, jerk.

1. If you are watching TV and playing DDO at the same time and you run right into a fire trap once, you can blame lag and no one will think twice about it. If you are watching TV and run through 3 fire traps in Dreams of Insanity and manage to not only kill yourself but the rogue who is trying to disable the trap and also bring back a nice mob of fire eles, iron golems, clay golems and those dwarf caster thingies and wipe the party consistently, then you are me and it's totally OK and no one will blame you if as soon as you are raised you play inspired courage.

I guess this was a long winded, not really needed post to say that if you are going to pike, ActiPike, or show your gimpiness, that's fine; just call it like it is though and stop blaming something that is convenient. Thanks!

To that cleric: You are a terrible cleric. I will not run with you again. When someone's health bar starts going down quickly, that should be warning enough that they need someone to heal them. That should be a hint to stop cometfalling and throw a heal. Yes, as a bard I can heal, and have no problem doing so. But when I am out of SP and you still have 75% of your bar and you tell me to play sustaining song and go back to cometfalling, that means you are a terrible cleric. When you let party members die and get whiny when they ask you for a raise dead, citing the fact that you need your SP for more cometfalls which is "just as effective as <insert way more effective spell/attack/song>", you are a terrible cleric. No one asked you to be a healbot, and I am wholly against ANY cleric being expected to just sit back and heal, but when you are the main reason people even NEED a heal, as can be evidenced by the fact that when the monk and I ran off during Framework and did GREAT until you showed up with 10^488 minotaurs in tow, then it is (and should) be expected of you.

Thanks!

[Maegin]

[Bwahahaha]

+1 rep...

You made me LOL...

[MalakRevan]

Good Top 10 list. +1 to you.

[irivan]

Thanks for the laugh, I wonder if this is going to get you what it got me with this...


http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=266506

[DFraser]

Very funny and true.
I take it #9 is a sore point?

[Llewndyn]

I think I responded to that thread too! I am not talking about people not being able to give advice, I am talking about people blaming lag on EVERYTHING ruining it for those who have lag ACTUALLY screw something up... though if you try to solo the Momma dragon in Mired in Kobolds at ALL then something terrible has or is about to happen

[andbr22]

ok one but:
But Dreams of Insanity don't have any traps or fire elementals, or clay golems, or dwarven casters :-P
I presume you mistake the quest (maybe Made to Order (but still no ellies)).

Still nice LAG awarness topic :P

[Llewndyn]

I know it makes NO sense but I get Dreams of Insanity and Made to Order mixed up ALL the time, as a matter of fact I joined the LFG for MtO and immediately went to house J and was waiting at Trakash before I realized what I had done...