The real etiquette problem in WoW


The way I see it, the real etiquette problem in WoW is the unrealistic expectations people place on PUGs. Everyone always thinks that when they are PUGing that that there is this entitlement that the run will be flawless and anything below that causes some people to legit go crazy. A recent example from last night comes to mind.I joined a fresh normal Battle of Dazar’alor pug and there was this other pug tank who I was speaking with in whispers just coordinating basic tank things and was a generally nice guy but maybe a bit inexperienced. Problem was that he was pulling bosses a few seconds everyone confirmed the ready check instead of using a DBM timer which is bad for obvious reasons. While he had done the same thing in Champions and Grong – there was no problem because we just one shotted the bosses and no one asked him to do otherwise. However he did the same thing on the next boss and we wiped which caused this epic rage from various people of this guild that had organized the PUG. In the meantime, all I’m saying is “calm down, you’re right, we got this, etc…” just to make sure that this wipe wasn’t going to cause people to rage quit. They link a discord and ask tanks to get on, which I do and I enter the middle of this epic rant from the RL basically shitting all over tanks in general and making all these wild assumptions about our personality and character. “I bet they think they're hot shit because they are tanks, motherf*cker I main a tank, who the f*ck do you think you are.” There was a lot more but honestly it was all so stupid and over the top it just caused me to instantly dislike this whole clique.Throughout the rest of the run, honestly, we were progressing quite nice, the other tank left after a bit (and they instantly started shitting on him) and pugs would come and go and this RL and his guildies were just bad mouthing everyone for the dumbest reasons. Any mechanic not done perfectly was met by a rant similar in style to the 50 DKP minus guy, even when it didn't result in a wipe or anything close to it... this is normal mode after all.Basically, in the end I just wasn’t enjoying myself. I was thinking, “god damn you guys are such a bunch of whiny douche bags, I’d rather do just about anything else than play with you all.” Even though we were doing fine, I just didn’t want to spend any more of my time with these assholes and just left after the next boss kill. The whole situation kind of reminded me of like when you have a co-worker who’s good at the job but is just such an insufferable prick you can’t help but dislike him. They take pride in the fact that “they’re just telling you hard truths, and you can’t handle it and that’s not my problem,” but it’s really more like although you have skill it’s outweighed by how much of an a-hole you are and I don’t want to be around you. Not to mention the whole tribalism aspect of “anyone in my guild is all right (although there were definitely shit players) and I’ll just place all blame on PUGs and demonize them to make us feel better about ourselves.I can give you countless other examples, after all I am a tank player that joined later in BFA, so I’ve had to pug mythic dungeons and withstand other people’s ungovernable rage when I did something wrong. I mean it’s not like you learn to tank the dungeon in a normal or heroic where you can just ignore any mechanic and move on; in M+ some things will actually kill you. But I’m always asking myself, what do you expect? This is a pug. If you want perfect execution and smooth runs, that’s what organized groups are for. I mean, everyone even runs raider.io now a days and you could even set up your criteria to say "well I'll only invite people above X rating." Don’t take me wrong I’m always glad when things work out perfectly in a PUG and have made some friends as a result of good runs, but it’s definitely not my expectation going in; it’s the exception.So to the WoW community, just calm down and understand that you won’t get perfect plays in PUGs, and instead of getting mad about it or make snarky comments just give advice in good faith and your run will be better off and players may be grateful to you for it. If everyone makes an effort to be a bit more understanding, patient and kind we’ll all benefit from it.