Language Barrier?

[slothinator]

Joined a PUG last night for Mired in Kobolds. They had already started, so I typed 'brt' and started running to catch up. Catch them at the shrine, we all buff, and continue on. No one is using voice, and there are no chat messages. OK, cool; everyone knows the quest. Get to the end, shrine, buff, bust crystals and enter the dragon. My pally and the barb are hacking the baby dragon, while the sorc, wiz, and cleric are healing/buffing/casting away.

It's over fast, everyone loots and shrines - I'm thinking great, we are gonna take out momma dragon. Momma lands, I grab aggro and kite her into the first crystal. I see this in the party chat:

"maile xxx xxx"

Where the x's represent words I don't understand. Then there are a couple more posts in a language I don't understand. As I am kiting the dragon to the next crystal, the barb dies and I see a d-door by the chests. The casters have bailed (wondered why no one was healing me!), and I now realize I am left to fight the dragon on my own (d-door disappeared as I ran toward it). I last about 5 minutes, and think I only got her down to about 75% before I bit the dust.

Is it the responsibility of the group leader to make it known that the group does not speak english, either in the LFM or in the chat, or should I have said something amidst the silence? This would not have the been the first PUG I joined where no one spoke, but instead just completed and went on our separate ways. Just want to know what the ettiquette/protocol is for a situation like this.

[Doxmaster]

Reverse it and see how it looks

[rexservorum]

Is it the responsibility of the group leader to make it known that the group does not speak english, either in the LFM or in the chat, or should I have said something amidst the silence? This would not have the been the first PUG I joined where no one spoke, but instead just completed and went on our separate ways. Just want to know what the ettiquette/protocol is for a situation like this.

Most of the time they do notify applicants in the LFM. The key phrase I see used most commonly is "guo ren." I don't know what it means (maybe someone else can answer?) but it seems to be the flag that the group is mainly Chinese players.

Otherwise, you can sometimes tell by their character names or what guild they are in.

In my experience, a lot of the Chinese players I've grouped with have known at least some English, so it doesn't hurt to type simple questions into the chat anyway.

[slothinator]

Reverse it and see how it looks

I've been in groups where 5 of us speak english, and the other player does not. Does that player have a responsibility to inform the group he doesn't understand what we are saying? I don't know; that is why I started this thread, so I could input from other players about this subject. This was my first time being the english speaker in a group speaking a foreign language.

[slothinator]

Most of the time they do notify applicants in the LFM. The key phrase I see used most commonly is "guo ren." I don't know what it means (maybe someone else can answer?) but it seems to be the flag that the group is mainly Chinese players.

Otherwise, you can sometimes tell by their character names or what guild they are in.

In my experience, a lot of the Chinese players I've grouped with have known at least some English, so it doesn't hurt to type simple questions into the chat anyway.

In this particular case, nothing stood about the character names. It's not like my "brt" in the chat was any indication for them. I think I will make it a point to be a little more vocal in the future, either over voice chat or typing out a complete sentence/phrase so that they know I speak english. I don't want to pass on PUG opportunities over something like language, because I don't think it is or should be a deal breaker. At least not for a quest like Mired in Kobolds.

[Doxmaster]

Started a PUG last night for Mired in Kobolds. A pally and a barb join late and we soon see them running to catch up with us. Everyone seems to know the quest and everything goes pretty well. We take down the baby dragon and then, everything went horribly wrong.

My bro, a wizard, pops a ddoor and we stand by it, expecting the Pally and barb to come running. Instead, the two drag the Momma dragon everywhere, outside of the range of my healing. I say “DDoor and we’ll prep for her” but they ignore this and keep fighting. Finally, my bro the wizard grows tired of it and tells me over vent “Lets leave these noobs” so we leave the two melees to die.

I later found out that the noobs don’t speak my language! Why can’t everyone learn Swahili?!

I hoped that people would at least have the decency to say “I no speak good” or something of the sort in my language when they join my party…

This is how it looks from the other side.

[slothinator]

Dox,

I realize that is exactly how it looks from the otherside. Only I did not find out there was a language barrier until the momma dragon battle. Too late to do anything about it by then. What I am looking for are solutions in the future to prevent this from happening again.

I sound like a 12 year old over voice chat, so I tend not to speak unless spoken to or I need to get out really important information - I'm not "chatty". Had I been more vocal at the beginning, or typed out "just entered, be right there" instead of "brt", I may have been hipped to the plan to bail after baby died a little earlier. Or at least been made aware of the potential language barrier.

[moops]

Dox,

I realize that is exactly how it looks from the otherside. Only I did not find out there was a language barrier until the momma dragon battle. Too late to do anything about it by then. What I am looking for are solutions in the future to prevent this from happening again.

I sound like a 12 year old over voice chat, so I tend not to speak unless spoken to or I need to get out really important information - I'm not "chatty". Had I been more vocal at the beginning, or typed out "just entered, be right there" instead of "brt", I may have been hipped to the plan to bail after baby died a little earlier. Or at least been made aware of the potential language barrier.

In this situation I let THEM lead the way. . .I just let them go ahead, I typically let the leader go first anyway when I pug because everyone does things different in these lowbie quests where some people might be experiencing the Dungeon for the first time. I can usually figure out what they mean to do just by hanging back a bit . . .If they throw a DDoor I dive for it.

Now that fight. .. We always kill her in place, never drag her to the crystals in both my English and Chinese groups, perhaps you really confused them, or perhaps they never meant to fight the Dragon in the first place, as many groups will opt to skip it on certain settings depending on what the groups level is as it might not work for good xp per minute.

[slothinator]

moops,

After I died and released, the three casters were gathered around the campfire/cook in the twelve. I assume that they had planned to skip momma all along, although you may be correct that I screwed up their plan by kiting the dragon into the crystals and they just decided to bail. They did shrine, but I didn't see any buffs, offensive spells, or healing come out of them. We also had the dragon in her starting spot for about two minutes before I kited her to the crystals. Maybe they shrined to have enough SP to cast the d-door; not sure, didn't look at their bar.

[nolaureltree000]

the group leader should have said something like "we're not doing the momma dragon". although maybe he did, but you just didnt understand it. you probably should have asked if the group was doing the momma dragon too. in my experience with the quest, most PUG groups dont try the momma dragon.

generally i just accept that there are lots of non-english speaking people on the server. especially when you play outside of non-american prime time hours. sometimes it creates a communication problem, but as long as everyone is somewhat familiar with the quest, it usually works out just fine.

i wouldnt expect people to announce what languages they can and cannot understand when joining a quest. sometimes ill join the groups that are labeled 'guo ren' when i sure as hell cant understand chinese, so i wouldnt expect the reverse of non-english speakers. i wouldnt join a chinese group if i had never done the quest before, but other than that, i see no problem with it.

[slothinator]

Thank you to everyone that posted. In the future I'll be sure to be a bit more vocal or "texty" when I PUG to avoid this kind of situation from developing. Then the group leader can decide if it is an issue and we can proceed from there.

[moops]

Also, just want to add that tho Sarlona has a large Chinese population, we also have a few Brazillian Guilds, and a at least one French guild.

[Arian_Varick]

I see used most commonly is "guo ren." I don't know what it means .

FYI

zhong guo = china
ren = person/people

So basically they are just stating that they are, in fact, Chinese.

[evilnatas]

in a situation like this i wouldn't take to heart having to eat a death after all others have recalled. true it sounds like there was a communication barrier between yourself and the rest of the party, but you knew that from the beginning, or should have if it is truly that important to you.

personally i generally dont use voice chat. but i've found "silent" runs like the ones you describe to be (literally) as rewarding as silent runs where i knew i could speak up and be understood immediately.

running quests with people that can't understand your voice communication or written communication really forces you to immerse yourself in your characters actions as your primary form of communication, and at the same time their actions as communicated to you. bluntly, you should have recognized this form of communication and taken the ddoor.

furthermore ) in situations like you and i have described i find emotes can employ an amplified and generally affective conveyance of your feelings/opinions.

as far as proper etiquette in this type of situation. my opinion would be to treat it as any other pug you join, but pay special attention that your only affective means of communication is through your characters actions, and vice versa.

personally the only non communicable groups i have ever joined on sarlona have been chinese. generally i let my walking do the talking and don't have any problems. but sometimes if i feel that i am being singled out i will type "mei guo ren" which i believe means "i am american". i dont' really know what this means to the people i type it to, but i've never been dropped because of it. I only type it in hopes that they understand that i don't grasp their verbal or written communication. hope this helps.