Stop this BB madness

[Ungood]

I think that it is nice to push for the new/little guy, but at some point those guys are just gonna accept your help and pike.

I like how the sig says "A chain is only as Strong as the weakest link", but not every member of the chan (community) will help that chain, and it is not everyones responsibility to help that person. It is however that players responsibility to help themselves, to learn, to ask, and to improve.

Did we all not need the same at one time? Honestly? Do we let the lessons stop with us? The info others gave us, do we become so greedy that we can't pass that on?

We all needed help at one time, no one started this game a master, and thus, like we learned, and grew, from the kindness of those before us, so, yes, we owe a debt of kindness to help others that come after us.

Anyways, fighting for the weakest link seems silly if the weakest link is truly useless.

You don't fight for the weak links, you help temper them and make them stronger.

But none of that matters: My Question Remains:

Why does this Practice of Linking BB's start at Shroud?

Why not at TS? I mean, to be fair, why not at Church in the Cult (your first real run in with needing a DR breaking Boss Mob)

Most times it's "have your silver weapons ready" but maybe requiring a linking of Silver to get in, might be a good idea, as no one reads the LFM (as per some of the other more funnier threads have pointed out)

[Ghaldar]

I'll do you one better (or worse depending on your point of view)
how about:
Shroud end boss DR bypassing melee weapons. or sebdbmw's

Lfm
Shroud: please link you sebdbmw's

(please note the poster of this thinks(i.e. me) it is REALLY funny and is chuckling to himself)

Woot much KC love.

[elg582]

Why Not At Ts? I Mean, To Be Fair, Why Not At Church In The Cult (your First Real Run In With Needing A Dr Breaking Boss Mob)

Stk!

[ssgcmwatson]

Orien PUGs fail Shrouds distressingly often; probably around 10% of PUGs end up wiping. This is largely because people don't know what they're doing, either when it comes to quest mechanics (splitting the lieutenants) or gearing their character (heavy fort/false life/+con etc).

After tonight's run, I'm tempted to change it to "healers - please list your SP and your definition of SP management"

[Lleren]

After tonight's run, I'm tempted to change it to "healers - please list your SP and your definition of SP management"

Keeping 8-10 folks alive through part 4+5. The squishiest two to four can die and stay dead.

[M0NKEYB0Y]

The OP is mis guided, when I run my healer I only pug groups where the leader is asking for DR breakers. No dr breakers no thanks...

[Vengeance777]

OK maybe it has gone too far. Just say a lfm asking people to show boss beaters for Hound of Xoriat, Lawful ColdIron according to the LFM's creator.

[wolflordnexus]

What you are missing, is that I have also mentioned that it is also not done for TS, Chrono, or when I think about it, VON/PON or even Abbot put this up. (and None of these raids can be soloed -at all-)

*** are you talking about TS and Von are jokes no special needs Sure 1 person can screw up a von but no ammont of linking will solve that. Chrono Is rarely ran without a 20 that could solo it on elite if you are running it at level You go out of your way to make sure the group is self sufficient. Your still comparing tonka trucks to driving a car.

But, linking BB's is this magical thing that happens at Shroud.

My question is simply "Why?"

Solmage offered no answer or insight into the practice, so maybe you would like to try your hand at clearing it up.

Shroud is where you actually start to learn the game the difficulty from previous content goes up. It's where the magic happens you can certainly cover for a few weak links but you need some serious players to cover anything more and you are going to waste resources doing it. I don't understand your confusion here If you don't bring the right tools to do the job you are piking and I won't have you piking my raid unless your a friend.

[wolflordnexus]

Did we all not need the same at one time? Honestly? Do we let the lessons stop with us? The info others gave us, do we become so greedy that we can't pass that on?

We all needed help at one time, no one started this game a master, and thus, like we learned, and grew, from the kindness of those before us, so, yes, we owe a debt of kindness to help others that come after us.

Don't know about you but I never went into shroud without a DR breaker they said I needed one and I got one payed every penny I had on 2 toons for it so I expect the same from everyone else

Why does this Practice of Linking BB's start at Shroud?

Why not at TS? I mean, to be fair, why not at Church in the Cult (your first real run in with needing a DR breaking Boss Mob)

Most times it's "have your silver weapons ready" but maybe requiring a linking of Silver to get in, might be a good idea, as no one reads the LFM (as per some of the other more funnier threads have pointed out)

Once again all these quests you mention are easy no one really considers TS a raid not even the devs that's why there's no timer. Church and the cult on normal is cake if 1 person has silver or if there is a caster in the vicinity I'm by no means a great player and I generally solo or duo it possibly put up a LFM stating in progress. why not bring a piker or 4 you may be surprised and meet someone new to run with.

[Nathlin]

What you are missing, is that I have also mentioned that it is also not done for TS, Chrono, or when I think about it, VON/PON or even Abbot put this up. (and None of these raids can be soloed -at all-)

For future reference, of that list only the Vault of Night raid is something that cannot be solo-ed. And that is due to quest mechanics. The other's that you mentioned can most definitely be soloed. (For the Abbot, this ofcourse depends on certain build choices)

[Ungood]

Don't know about you but I never went into shroud without a DR breaker they said I needed one and I got one payed every penny I had on 2 toons for it so I expect the same from everyone else

I suppose this really answers my question.

Thank you.

[Phemt81]

We all needed help at one time, no one started this game a master, and thus, like we learned, and grew, from the kindness of those before us, so, yes, we owe a debt of kindness to help others that come after us.

I quote this so some people may read and learn something... You really should turn on reputation Ungood.

And to your questions, i agree. My party was TOTALLY destroyed at boss in made to order quest, no one said "bring an anarchic weapon"...

[pSINNa]

Spent my first night on Orien starting the whole box and dice again bout 14 hours ago.

Every shroud LFM i saw go up asked 'please link BB's'.

It actually does happen like that on Orien.


In roughly 300 shroud runs on Ghallanda, i've never been asked even once.

I pug most of my shrouds on Ghallanda, and perhaps 1 out of every 30 runs actually fails (and then it's usually from some bizarre problem that is not related to dps output).

Strange fruit indeed, can't wait to get my new stable up to shroud levels and see where it's at.

Coit out~

ps (just thought i'd add, i pug my healers out for shroud on ghallanda as well, with absolutely no qualms about it)

[Iphigen]

Well, let me get some things strait:

I am neither a noob nor a whiner. In fact I have some 30 shroud completions (including 4 elite runs) on Iphigen, solo
healed most raids and am running epics. I got a L20 melee khopesh toon and perfectly understand the game
mechanics concerning DR. Some might need +100 completions to qualify for a competent opinion on that topic. I
don't.

The L20 normal difficulty raiding content in DDO is easy. It would most likely be 5 men content in other MMOs I have
played. As a mater of fact some raids are soloable with the right builds and some commitment. I belief, that the
majority of players is not limited by the completion time but raid timer.

Nonetheless inefficient raiding or even failure is nothing we enjoy doing. Therefore I spend the last weeks PUGing in
the worst possible groups I could find and analyzed them.

I conclude my findings:

1. Main reasons for long completion times are:

- Buffing is not done effectively. In some PUGs buffing is not coordinated at all, some players not even use the
shrines in part 4 to refill their depleted manapool which is very annoying.

- Even though there is a nice thread on the forums about completing the puzzle some very experienced players still
use that dumb puzzle solver and therefore are slow with the puzzle.

- Low DPS on portals. (!)

- Melees need too much healing in the first part of the last part of shroud. I doubt that more than 50% of the
shrouders in an orien PUG understand the game mechanics of that part or some basic concepts like kiting and focus
fire.

- Fail aggro management in part 2.

All these failures potentially cause more delay than the difference between a 1 and a 2 rounder on part 4.


2. Failing shroud

- With 2 decent healers in you group the main (only) reason for failure is lag. Even if you care to keep some
squishies up the healers have more than 50% of their SP after round one and some clickies unused. SP is not the
limiting factor here! Not at all if your healer is build right!

- Damage mitigation via evasion + reflex and/or a HP pool that allows for efficient healing are far more important
than DPS in shroud part 4. Even with 4 healers (3 of which I know they don't suck) in group we could not avoid
casualties in part 4. Instakilled, 20% raid damage lost, but he had BBs!

- It is very hard to find groups that are capable of failing in part 1. In the two groups I managed to find other
classes did not compensate for the mages not doing their job.

- If a shroud run fails most likely the healers don't have quicken or are some sort of wannabe dps build and melees
are squishy and the group is awful.


I am sick of that whining! No, you don't need this or that. All you need is a few decent players from your f-list and
almost everything is doable even without a full raid/party or "needed" classes. And although BBs are an indication
that you have some sort of clue. I rather raid with "undergeared" twinks that understand the basic concepts and
strategies than with a bunch of uberrofl that keep repeating false L16 paradigms like mindless drones.

over and out

[Khanyth]

As someone who's DDO time has become limited, because of RL priorities, there is one major reason why I support the asking for DR/BBers in Shroud:

To save time.

If there is a choice between a shroud pug LFM with a BB/DR requirement, and a shroud pug LFM without a DR/BB requirement, I'll gladly link my beaters and join the one who wants to get the shroud run done as quickly and effeciently as possibly. Yes, I know that DR beaters are not necessary. I don't care about nessessity... I care about getting the completion done asap and moving on.

In RL, I just don't have time to waste on a shroud fail. When most of the times, you can only log on for an hour or so, I don't have time to fail on parts because people think that they don't have to break DR to damage a portal or a boss.

Sorry.... I just don't. I'm not being a d-ick or a dooooshbag or a elitist or a prick (I promise!).... I have a kid who takes hour-ish naps and a wife who will let me play DDO for most of the times that our kid naps. I don't have the time to wait for a raid to fill, and then have it full of DPSers who can't bypass DR.

I do a lot of PUG's.... a LOT. I'm talking 99.5ish % of my DDO experience has been PUGS. Of all the shroud runs that I have done, the only shroud runs that really fail for me are the ones that do not ask/require DR/BBers. I can only think of 1 or 2 DR/BBer required shroud runs that failed, and was due to a computer crash or two.

So for those who keep running Shroud runs, asking to have DPS link their BBer/DRers.... keep on keepin on!

[gwenniez]

Spent my first night on Orien starting the whole box and dice again bout 14 hours ago.

Every shroud LFM i saw go up asked 'please link BB's'.

It actually does happen like that on Orien.


In roughly 300 shroud runs on Ghallanda, i've never been asked even once.

I pug most of my shrouds on Ghallanda, and perhaps 1 out of every 30 runs actually fails (and then it's usually from some bizarre problem that is not related to dps output).

Strange fruit indeed, can't wait to get my new stable up to shroud levels and see where it's at.

Coit out~

ps (just thought i'd add, i pug my healers out for shroud on ghallanda as well, with absolutely no qualms about it)

I started on Orien so i was kinda used to the BB madness, when i moved i noticed the same thing..

noone asked for it on Thelanis..

they did hox completely different too hehe..

Guess all servers are different in there aproach, no idea who started the bb madness here tbh.. its been like
that from day 1..

[Forgeborn]

for my own opinion on this matter:
I'd prefer it if we didn't need to ask for BB's/DR breakers, but face it; A lot of people on orien are somewhat newish players, and don't have the proper equipment to handle hard or elite shroud runs, and even on normal they're quite ineffective due to poor gear or builds.

I know enough people that do have the proper equipment, but it just irks me, as a player, if I notice that people are using weapons on harry that don't bypass the DR and don't have any heavy damage proc (looking at you lit II) to make up for the lost dps.

On a normal shroud run I don't mind much, but on hard or elite I do think everyone should have at least a basic good+silver damage typed weapon.

I started on Orien so i was kinda used to the BB madness, when i moved i noticed the same thing..

noone asked for it on Thelanis..

they did hox completely different too hehe..

Guess all servers are different in there aproach, no idea who started the bb madness here tbh.. its been like
that from day 1..

I do believe from this thread that Bril started the 'BB madness', or at least the practice of asking for them: http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=295176

[Sinni]

argh, stop using "BB" for "Boss Beater"

it took me a whole **** page to understand and i was confused all the time why the hell you need Blade Barriers for Shroud...

[kernal42]

argh, stop using "BB" for "Boss Beater"

it took me a whole **** page to understand and i was confused all the time why the hell you need Blade Barriers for Shroud...

Interestingly enough, different servers have different 'slang.' On Orien, "BB" is often used in reference to Boss Beaters. The context of the post makes this unambiguous.

There's no need for you to come all the way from Thelanis to complain about how you aren't familiar with abbreviations on the Orien forum.

-Kernal

[Sinni]

Interestingly enough, different servers have different 'slang.' On Orien, "BB" is often used in reference to Boss Beaters. The context of the post makes this unambiguous.

There's no need for you to come all the way from Thelanis to complain about how you aren't familiar with abbreviations on the Orien forum.

-Kernal

i never ever heard or read that abbreviation. not only on Thelanis but also in the forums. and i don't know of any other "server-slang-words" as it usually evens out due to the forum.

and believe me, it doesn't make it so unambigious if you don't even consider BB being anything other than Blade Barrier. I only got it due to Razcar's joke