It's the people that make the difference

Yesterday I joined what would turn out to be the worst PuG I have been in since WotLK; possibly vying for the worst PuG ever.

People died on trash. People died several times on every boss (it was heroic Stonecore), more often than not making the same mistake. We cycled through people that left the group during the course of the dungeon; probably 2-3 healers and more than 10 different DPS. I had to repair at least twice, and that's not counting all the times I survived a wipe through liberal use of Feign Death and Shadowmeld.

After each wipe, I questioned why I was staying. After all, it's one thing to stick in a PuG that wipes a couple of times (the PuG queue for DPS is often 40min long), but it's quite another when downing each boss in the dungeon is as difficult as a progression raid.

Each time, however, something made me stay. Partly it was the tank, who continuously made suggestions as to how the group could improve (even though these suggestions, whilst helpful, didn't always address the problems the group had with a particular boss). Mostly, though, it was the last healer that joined, a player that continuously failed to avoid the falling rocks on the last boss but was so sunnily optimistic that I refused to give up on them.

I guess what impressed me the most was that these players, whilst possessing considerably less skill than the average raider, just kept trying. And trying. And trying. Even when I'd made my frustration abundantly clear at one point by matter-of-factly stating that it was the worst PuG I'd been in but was sticking around anyway, the healer laughed it off and assured everyone that we would get it "this time!" (we didn't).

After 3 hrs, by which time the only person left from the original group besides me was the tank, we finally (messily) killed the last boss. I stayed in the group long enough to type that I was glad I'd stuck it out and hoped they'd all learnt something (the only person without the Stonecore Achievement dinging at the end was me, unsurprisingly), and was cheered by their response that they had (mainly how to avoid the rocks and interrupt Force Grip).

Of course, it didn't quite make up for the repair bill or time spent in there (and certainly didn't stop me detailing the stupid mistakes the group was making to my guild as they occurred), but I did stay until the end... which made me reflect on the fact that if the people hadn't been as nice as they had, I would have dropped group without a second thought.

Attitude matters, people... and practice makes perfect :P