PUGs are Dead---Not!

Well met!

As most of you are aware, negative threads concerning PUGs and the Guild Wars community appear regularly in this forum. My experience is at odds with what seems to be the prevailing opinion. I belong to a relatively small guild. As a result, especially when chest running or attempting to cap an elite, I go it alone. But when it comes to missions, especially the tougher ones, I generally PUG. Last night, for example, I wanted to do Vizunah with my relatively new, then lvl 13, Assassin. Of course, the search function displayed no information. I then turned on local chat. There were the usual spammers, but also, again as usual, various people looking for groups, groups looking for specific roles, runners, etc. I was, and, being an iconoclast, never am, one of the popular classes or builds. So I formed my own group, accepted most applicants readily, chatted with them as the group formed (the two necros were entertaining as they hashed out who was going mm and what skills to carry, etc.), and we were off. As usual, at least one of us knew what he was doing (no, it wasn't me, lol) and took the lead. We took Masters!

Roughly 80-90% of my PUG experience is this good. 90% of the rest is at least adequate. I believe it is because it is what I expect, and I actually talk with the people on my team. What I would like to know is whether I am alone in my experience or whether there are others like me. If you generally have good experiences with PUGs, please post a reply, and include how you go about selecting a group to join, form a group, etc. (Of course you are free to flame me as a naive fool, lol!)

Let me add that I have taken my main character to Hell's Precipice in Tyria, and a good bit of Cantha and Elona as well. (However, as Socrates once said: "[t]he beginning of wisdom is to admit to knowing nothing" (or words to that effect, lol).)

Wo Tan Ki, Ranger, Knights of Shadowpeak (KoS)

PuG's aren't dead, just comatose.

Occasionally it twitches a finger or sighs in response to verbal cues, but, generally, the prognosis for a full recovery is low as long as the PuG is deprived of sustenance.

PuG's are amazing, dynamic and offer widely varied experiences within a game. They are a standard of online gaming and a huge part of why people choose to play games. Unfortunately, the overall quality of PuG's degenerates rather quickly when not used with a certain level of frequency.

Also, heavy usage of Heroes and Henchmen has been known to reduce PuG'ing skills and social intercourse.

i just look for someone doing the same mission as me. aside from that i don't really care. too often have i discovered how stupid some people are by trying to hold a conversation with them. so i just stay quiet and people don't even know i'm there, which is good. because i hate it when they ask me quesitons about my build and then think just because their secondary is ranger they can tell me how to play. i'm not going to rant now though

I think it also has to do with the time and area you're playing. For example in a first mission area in cantha at 5 pm est usa you're probably not going to get a good pug group. In the domain of anguish at 3 am with a group of adults on vent or ts I generally find a highly experainced group that may fail once or twice but stays the course until we win. I stay guildless and pug because it's fun meeting new people. When I have been in guilds and play with a set group of people they wear on me after awhile and start to wierd me out.

I don't think vizunah square says anything about pugging lvl. Especially not if you're doing local quarter. 1ouprob had luck getting a good foreign quarter group to do 80 % of the load. Btw what we're you thinking doing vizunah @ lvl 13? Lvl 18 is minimum, and it should be lvl 20. It's not like it's hard, or takes much time to get to lvl 20 in cantha. Quest exp galore.

PUG are always interesting. As I get further in the games I tend to do more stuff with guildies because I know how good they are, plus they all have monks.

I beat all of factions with a PUGs and most of Nightfall. All you need is a few people who know what they're doing. My guild leader and I found a random, good mesmers last night.

Well met!

Excuse my audacity! What determines the minimun, pray tell? As it happens, I have been to Cantha before. My Assassin, Shodan Ki, has a Ranger secondary, skills from Kaineng City (max Exotic armor (chest and leggings were all I could afford at the time, lol), and the knowledge (and Green recurve) of Wo Tan Ki, lvl 20 Ranger, my main character, and the support of his guild, the Knights of Shadowpeak (KoS). However, I shall be certain to call on you before I allow him to go on any more missions, to be certain that he meets the minimum requirements (whatever they are), so as not to give offense (rofl)!

Howdy, if you've read any of my posts here you already know that I love to PUG most missions. I agree that most of my PUG experiences have been fun (win or lose). 2 nights ago I went into the UW with a group advertising itself as a UW trapping group. My ranger joined up and very quickly I realized...

1. They weren't a trapping group.
2. They had no clue what a trapping group is.
3. Heck, I'm not even sure they knew what ranger skills are available.

But, they were all very nice, friendly and enjoyable to PUG with. We entered the underworld and stayed for an hour killing stuff and generally having fun. 1 of the guys really wanted to cap a spider so we did that.

I was tempted to leave the group before we warped in because I could tell they were clueless about trapping, but there were no other trapping groups forming and overall I'm glad I stuck it out with them.

I will agree with Mr Groovy, however. I too feel that Level 13 is too low for Viznuah Square and if I had been a group leader there I would have rejected you for that reason. The odds are that a Level 13 would be useless and I wouldn't want to risk our chances. I mean no offense by this and I'm also not saying that your assassin wasn't a valuable contribution to the team. It all depends on the player behind the keyboard. An experienced player with a brand new level 10 character is better than someone playing a Level 19 first character.

Every so often, I'll see something like the following conversation when I get into a town/outpost in the local chat:

Player 1: LFG for mish!
Player 1: LFG for mish!
Player 2: Just add heroes/henchmen
Player 1: I need human monks in party, not NPC
Player 2: No you don't. I've been all the way through to Abbadon's Gate without ever needing another human player in my party... ever

And that's great for that guy, but some of us like the teamplay aspect of fighting alongside other humans. I have to say, that in the past few days I've been in a PuG for the last handful of missions in Nightfall and each success has been nothing short of sweet. I feel more of a sense of accomplishment with a PuG than I ever have when I've solo'ed with heroes/henchmen. Sure, you get the AFK'er or the dude that drops halfway through, but in my experience that's the exception rather than the norm.

At any rate, keep the PuG scene going strong! I'd rather have a human monk or human nuker or human anything over the AI heroes/henchmen any day.

LOL! That is hilarious.

It sounds just like a drug commercial for a condition only 1 out of 5 can get.

The quality of PuGs is definitely a ton better than many people would lead you to believe. It is human nature to remember those experience that were terrible and overlook the times that were good...even if those good times outnumber the bad times. Marv Levy was once quoted that he could win 14 games, but the pain of losing the 2 games during the season would carry with him well into the next season.

The title of this thread is a bit misleading, though. There is no arguing that the availability of PuGs has diminished....the cause of that is up to debate, however. If any of you doubt that claim, I challenge you to form a PuG (that contains no heroes or henchmen) in The Eternal Grove in less than 30 minutes.

Most pugs I've been in of late have only hero monks. Just accept whatever classes and fill in the healer spots with heroes.

"6/8 lf 2 monks" is annoying to see, esp when you invite yourself to the team and see that they have 2 (non-healer) heroes in there.

Formed a pug for masters in the Eternal Grove last night in about 5 mins. 4 players and 4 heroes. We could have gotten a full human team (not sure about 2 healers though) but other players would not drop their heroes so we could invite them (even though we asked them to). I went there at primetime after finding 1 human there my previous 2 trips.

I will admit this is something that I find very very annoying. I don't mind taking Heroes at all, but I also feel that it should be the group leader's decision whether to take them or not. If the leader wants to drop the heroes in order to grab another human then it's extremely rude not to drop them.

If you feel strongly that your heroes are the better choice then please say so, but if the leader again asks to drop them, then drop them! Trust me, Koss won't get his feelings hurt when he's kicked.

I was leader once at Viznuah Square (one of these days, I'll learn to spell that) and a Level 20 monk joined up with us. He brought along 3 Level 8 heroes as well which filled up the team to 8 spots. I politely asked him to dump the heroes and we'd get more people. He said "No!! My heroes are the best!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" . Again, I told him to dump them since they were only Level 8. He refused and just spammed over and over again, "start mission!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" I finally kicked him and found other players. I hated to kick a monk, but he would have been more hinderance than help.

Don't get me wrong here. I'm not arguing that human players are better than the heroes. All I'm saying is that it should be the group leader's decision. If you disagree, politely state your case to the leader. If you still disagree then either bow to his decision or leave and start your own group.

Last PUG I joined failed the mission we were doing first try (Eternal Grove). One person rage-quit, the rest stayed, and we got Master's on try #2. Most PUG's are adequate, some are good, some are bad. The problem is that there's no way to tell ahead of time what any given PUG is going to be like. Despite many good experiences, I've encountered enough sheer idiots of various stripes (everything from bad players to racist spammers) to permanently discolor my impression of PUG's.

It's pretty awesome that only one person could screw the pug, this happened me last night I was doing the Dzagonur Bastion mission, 1 ele got into our group, we were doing fine until he started pinging at his location i was calling target at a different spot so the party didnt focus and we failed, he left we got a rit, everyone followed targets, and we walked through the mission like a breeze, was awesome, we danced with the mobs and got masters in an incredible short time ñ_ñ i have to mention this was very fullfilling(sp?)

To the OP:
If you had to go by the forums, then yeah, PUGs are dead. But, when you play the game, PUGs are still holding their own.
I might use my W/E to go farming with hero's, but I like bringing my monk out of retirement every now and then, and helping PUGs with the Fire missions in Prophecies.
PUGs are doing fine...

I fear pugging as a monk these days and would rather not with any other class. Most of the time I end up in a group that tosses in one hero monk with some god-awful and useless bar (stop with the vigorous spirit, please) and with little or no useful communication people are all over the map while I desperately run back and forth trying to heal and prot. I recall many times where my PUG absolutely failed to succeed at a mission so I simply drop after, grab heros and beat it in one go. I'm also in a reasonably large and active guild so if I happen to want to PvE I'll either get a guild team or most of a team or just do it solo. Really the PUG is pretty much dead to me. If I didn't have a guild I might be a little more inclined to PUG for the social aspect and the off chance of meeting people whose guild I might like to be a part of so for people in that position I can understand.

PUGs are still around, and it's good to hear that the OP's experience with pugs were good. But for some people including myself the bad pugs out weight the good pugs.

Yes it can be fun when the team come together and finished the mission/quest, but after that everyone would just say "GG" and left, you will never see them again. And as for the bad one, well most of you knew about it already.

These day most pvers are already in the Guild, and with the guildies and heroes, they won't need to spam LFG. Unless it's a really hard mission or elite area.

But yeah pugs are still out there. Be it good or bad.

This made me laugh so very hard!!

Now, I can't play melee characters especially well, but I tried out Dervish and found myself in the foreign quarter of Vizunah at lvl 14. I loaded up with non-lvl 20 heroes, and some hench and got full hench from the local quarter. I got Masters on the first try. Level 18 is minimum? You make me laugh!

*wipes tears from eyes*

That's because Togo is a lame rit-spiker!

I rarely PUG at all, doing most stuff with guildmates and/or heroes. But because Eternal Grove is such a pill to hero/hench and no guildies were on I joined a PUG in Eternal Grove last weekend that formed in about 5-10 minutes (including re-ordering the group twice.) We ended up with 3 assassins (including my toon), 1 MM, 2 healers, 1 dervish, and an ele. I was doing critical barrage while the other two assassins were straight melee. The two melee sins, the MM and a healer took left while the rest of us went right. And to my utter surprise we took masters easily. Only had one slight problem when the warrior boss showed up on the left side and killed a few folks but the rest of us were able to come over and rez and recover. Lucky to get in such a good group, especially one that formed up that quickly.

Good PUGs are a blast. Bad PUGS...well, at best they can be amusing.

I too have good luck when it comes to PUG's.

I talk with the group etc. I guess it's my habit from the betas and early days of GW.

It's what makes Guild Wars... Guild wars, to me. :]

All my heros are lvl 20 so I try to find time to bring real people and join other groups whenever I can!

ive never had a bad pug i pugged all of proph and most of cantha

But i found just about all the missions easy to just fly through with some well build heroes and forcing you to take em once in a while deosnt help (got one -- meh ill just hench this) Pugs are definetly more fun its a real shame on newer players...

Ok, I'll admit. I ragequit last night. This is a first for me, I'm usually very easy going but these guys just got on my nerves. I wasn't in too good of a mood to start with however so I guess I shouldn't have PUGGed.

My monk was in The Wilds and since I need to hone my monking skills, I refuse to hench a mission with her. I will always go with others if possible. I only needed the bonus on this mission so I advertised "LFG for mission and bonus".

3 Warriors had been standing around for awhile trying to form a group and they invited me and a ranger (who is a real life friend) into the group. We also picked up a Necro.

They whispered me and asked if I knew the mission. I said I did and they sounded happy. We warped into the mission and things just went downhill from there. As soon as we warped in, one of the warriors asked us to wait because his friend was busy. (I think all 3 warriors knew each other).

Since we were standing around doing nothing, I asked if everyone knew the bonus. I knew my ranger friend knew it and the Necro said he did. The warriors had no clue what it was. I said that was fine and just to follow me and please don't kill the centaurs.

While waiting and waiting and waiting someone got too close to the initial group and we attacked and killed them.

We then got cussed out for not waiting.

We forged ahead and killed all the initial mobs before the branch off to the bonus. At this point one of the warriors asked everyone to head back to town.

Why?

"Just because"

Nope, not good enough, let's continue on.

I said again that I needed the bonus when they started down the wrong direction. Most of them followed me except for one guy who insisted we were going the wrong way. He eventually followed though. At this point I said again, "don't kill the centaur scouts".

About halfway down the path the 3 warriors decide to charge ahead and of course they charge right up to the centaurs and start attacking even with 3 of us screaming "NOOOO!!!! STOPPPP!!!!!!" at the top of our lungs.

Once the centaurs were dead, I resigned and said we needed to restart. Hey, you guys wanted to go back to town anyways, right? Nope, they wanted to continue on.

At that point, I lost it. I said some things I really shouldn't have and quit. My friend and the Necro popped back into town quickly as well. The 3 warriors showed up about 5-10 minutes later. One of them just started cussing me out for leaving, but one of the others whispered an apology to me.

My friend and I found a 2nd group and restarted. This group was much much nicer and we really had a good time with them.

I guess in retrospect I should have handled it differently. They were obvoiusly young kids. Heck, even the cuss words they were using were aimed at the 7-10 year old age range (Turd, poopyhead). At least I didn't use any adult cuss words either. That's not my style. I think "moron" is the strongest term I'll use online.

For every good PuG experience I can think of, I've had 10 bad PuG experiences. Yes, PuGing in any group that doesn't contain morons is a great experience, I've just found it so hard to find such groups. I imagine, that the more experienced are playing now that Nightfall has been out for a while. Wait till Chapter 4 to see all the idiots come back out of the woodwork.

Some of the most fun I've had has been Pugging in THK and FoW

ive had great times as well....infact 90% of the time...i pug.

QFT I remember doing Vizunah back in the day when factions was just out. It took a good Group, be it pug or guild to get Master on that mission. Now I did the mission again last week and it seemed that anet eased up that mission. And we were talking about pugs, and not about Hero/ Henchway.

To bring full potential to a pug team (and no that's not taking hero's with 1337 skills, armor and weapons ) your char must be around lvl 20. I only accept lvl 20 in my team for vizunah. (for foreign Quarter, local I would consider lvl 18). And I self make the effort to lvl my own char's to lvl 20. And it's not like it's time consuming to get to lvl 20 in cantha. All the quests + missions on the starter island will land you to lvl 18. Do some fed ex quests in kaneing center and you're there.

So you're telling me you played a crit ranger, and instead of truely pugging you also had some help of Guildies? Any officer in my guild, including myself would have recommended you to lvl your sin, because a: you have more health to endure, and b: do more damage/ longer interruptions. You get my drift.

About Pugging, I almost hardly ever pug. The times when I pug, most of the players are either not doing there job properly or they simply don't listen and screw up master. Which I end up getting in the second try with Hero/ Henchway. Now if there was only a way for anet to detect idiot players

Personally, I find a PUG of 4 players and 4 heroes one of the nicest to play. Especially with Teamspeak.

Of course, it's not always appropriate. What I dislike about PUG play mostly is the rudeness towards new players, and the insults that flow when things go wrong. If the mission or quest fails, just regroup, rebuild skills and try again.

Hero-friendly players tend to be more relaxed about that, in my experience.

Luck and Pugs I say.I just got people having a free ride through misson lately.
And dont trust monk with muscle and tattoos becuase they are 55 hp monks.

Erm, no. My monk's energy armor is the Citadel tatoo armor, becuase that's all there was in Prophecies. It's not just for 55 monks...

Well met!

When I began playing Guild Wars, my attitude was, if anything, stricter than yours. I did not consider joining a guild because I felt that I had nothing to offer. I wanted to have a certain level of skill first. I henched 99% of the time, having the same attitude about joining a PUG. I started with Prophecies, and my Ranger, Wo Tan Ki, took a long time to get to lvl 20. I joined my guild, Knights of Shadowpeak, while I was wandering in the wilderness, literally and figuratively, in the Crystal Desert. Running was prevalent, but I wanted to do things rightly. I did not even have a max damage bow until I was given one (+5 Energy longbow) by a guild mate. (I still refer to it as the "Gift".) For quite a while, I still mostly henched, to cap skills. I considered this to be personal, and did not want to enlist aid for it. Gradually I began to grow comfortable with my guild, and helped and received help with various missions and capping certain skills. And I began to PUG when my guild mates were in Cantha and/or Elona. I got lucky with a PUG that started in Thunderhead and went all the way to Abbadon's Mouth. My guildmates and I finished Hell's Precipice. They are so good; they blow through everything. I thought I was reasonably good. Then we did Defend Droknar's Forge. What a rude awakening, lol! I was worse than useless. I panicked, ran the wrong way into additional mobs, aggroing everything in sight, forgot to bring a rez (before, in previous missions, they had even told me not to bring it as I wouldn't need it), got killed repeatedly, etc., etc., etc. Very humbling. The first step towards wisdom is to admit you know nothing. They suggested some build modifications, and we succeeded on our third attempt.

Now, as to my Assassin: you are undoubtedly correct on all points. I was impatient, and got to Kaineng City for the skills as soon as I could. With a bow, he can contribute and survive, in spite of his level, in most situations he encounters at this point. However, now, with his new Cruel Golden Daggers of Fortitude, req 12, he is having a rough time. He will only hench until he becomes minimally competent, which may take quite a while. The lesson with my Ranger is not lost on me, namely, that the journey to Mastery has only just begun with the acquisition of a wide selection of skills.

I have said all that to say this: I am a novice, struggling for a minimum level of competence, and realizing every day just how complex the considerations for play in this game are, and how much I have to learn. It is a daunting task, even with one or two characters. I am in awe of those who are so masterful at this game that they are "running out of things to do"! The kind of ability I am now seeking transcends my skillbar and equipment. You get my drift?

Thank you for your advice; please feel free to further advise me as you see fit.

Hi there, Kolaloski. You sound like a kindred spirit. I'm in the same position. I've been playing for about 6 months. I haven't yet reached a lot of the elite areas mainly because I've been playing a variety of characters and doing the low level stuff over and over again in each game with different professions.

I too want to contribute to the team in each pug I join. I feel that any rewards I receive should be the result of my skills and not from a run by a buddy. My guild usually offers to help run beginners thru missions and quests, but I've always declined. I'm willing to help out others that need it but I prefer to earn my mission completion rewards myself.

I always hench a mission that I've never seen before. I don't think it's fair to drag down a pug that usually knows just where to go and what to do to complete it. I like to explore new areas alone and take my time learning the path. Unfortunately, I did that this weekend with the Unwaking Waters mission for the first time. I grabbed a few heroes and henchies and headed into the mission. Once in there I discovered real people!!! ACKKK!! OOPS!
Dang co-op missions!

Anyways, if you'd like some semi-competent company on your learning journey, look me up in-game. I'm not the best player out there but most pugs that I've joined have considered me an asset to the team rather than a hinderance.

In my view, it's not that PuG's are dead or that no one PuG's anymore or that PuG's can no longer be fun.

The issue is that people, generally, aren't as good at playing with others because the game has lessened the necessity for grouping with others.

Three campaigns into the game, people now can easily decide whether to spend time looking for a PuG or pressing onward with their improved Henchmen and/or Heroes.

Once ANet gave us the ability to "direct" Henchmen with the flag controls, the reliability of Henchies improved significantly.

With the advent of Heroes in the latest chapters the improvement is even more pronounced.

Some will say, "Oh! Not the tired old argument that Heroes/Henchies hurt PuG'ing!" But, what, pray tell, would the improved AI impact upon other than PuG'ing?

I can only judge how my game has changed and extrapolate from there. I combine that with my observations of others and arrive at the conclusion:

Heroes/improved Henchies reduce the likelihood of PuG'ing across the board.

And less PuG'ing means people become unaccustomed to working and dealing with each other.

This isn't an absolute situation, there are plenty of exceptions, but it is a general game trend.

Playing with other players is significantly different than playing solo with AI help. The skill sets are different and the need for coordination much more important. The whole concept of teamwork becomes readily apparent.

PuG'ing has never had the pride of place in any online game that I have ever played, starting in my early days of DAoC and on to many others.

PuG'ing will always take a back seat to grouping with friends and guildees; and now, more often than not: heroes and improved henchmen.

So, PuG'ing has dropped down at least a notch, and that's a shame because it decreases the opportunities to make new friends and acquaintances with in the game world.

I have a tendency to hero/hench my way through the easy quests and missions of the game purely because it is alot faster to build a group to get through the mission. I have been gaming with most of my guild since the betas so I do a bunch of stuff with them. When PUGing it I tend to form groups as I find I have a higher rate of success picking up the characters who may not be the classes wanted by everyone else and just filling in the rest from there.

I get most of my negativity towards PUGs from the fact that they are set into cookie cutter groups (a tank, nuker, MM, healer, ect.) and dismiss other builds (healing rits, sins, paragons, mesmers, ect.)

I have had a bunch of good groups of PUGs and I have had bad groups where the monk rage quits the first time someone dies