PUGS (Pick Up Groups) are sometimes both the bane and boon of players' existences in MMOs. In her latest Pokket Says, Hillary Nicole takes a look at PUGs and her history with them over the years. Read on!

Most of my friends had quit or left me for other servers, so I was forced to PUG my way through heroics and raids, I couldn't be hassled finding a raiding guild, especially one with strict guidelines. Naturally, the group finder in WoW made it easier to find a group to run heroics with and within a few weeks I had both toons geared enough to start raiding the normal mode of ICC (Icecrown Citadel).

Read more of Hillary Nicole's Pokket Says: Level of Difficulty - PUGs.

Pugs make you appreciate your friends more.

Great read, thanks

Old PUGs:  Working an hour to form a group, getting everyone to travel there, and watching the group break up after wiping badly on the first pull.

New PUGs: Grouped in 15 minutes using a tool, instant teleportation to dungeon, mad dash run through because the dungeon is now in easy mode.

At least the new way produces results, but somehow it's not the same as a guild run with clued players and a bit of challenge to beat the dungeon.

Nice read and very true in a lot of MMOs! Thanks

I loved pugging with random strangers who never said a word. after countless runs, i got wise. when you seen one of these people speak you just left because you know they're gonna piss the healer off or the tank and the group would fall apart anyways.

I had a friend who use to cut his arms. he also played Wow and told me pugging was much better then cutting. i was blown away by that comment..

Lichking heroics were pretty awesome. I did raid the lichking it was pretty awesome.for me Wow died when arthas died....yes i'm a wrath baby i admit it :)

I had a lot of fun doing pugs in tbc and wrath across different servers and toons. If raiding heavily, you spend so much time with the same 10-25 people that it's refreshing to actually play wow with other people on your server.

One of the things I hated about Cata was the death of using your spare lockout to form pugs from trade.

Also, heyday has one a.

I was new once.

When I first started MMOing, I didnt play the same game as all my RL friends.

Back then I only had PUGs. They helped me learn and I made friends.

All this, "I don't PUG.", just reminds me of a middle school hallway, and gives me a headache.

I hate PUGS. If I cant find a good guild to play with, Ill just play another game.

Old PUGs: Spend an hour gathering a group, travel everyone to the dungeon, wipe on the first pull, half the group leaves.

New PUGs: Spend 15 mins in queue, instant teleport to dungeon, face roll through easy mode content as fast as possible.  k-thx-bye.

Neither much on enjoyable gameplay, but at least with the new method it's productive.

i love PUGs. :)

I also started gaming with UO, EQ and AC and I do not, in any way believe that a 12 year old could have played UO under the conditions of that game.  You don't have the intellect, thought processes, coordination or even the wisdom/experience at 12 to stay alive long enough to chop wood.  Fanboy's may dream about following some young girl gamer, but keep it real.  Even your knowledge of WoW is limited. You seem to have no idea what raiding was like before dungeon finders were added to some games and thus the dumbing down of content so uncoordinated groups could get their loot.  Just be honest, tell us what you know and really experienced.  Maybe an action screenshot would help prove you were there, then again I suppose you can get those anywhere.  After you've finished an article/blog, maybe a spell and grammar check might be an idea too.

-Lisa (a real female gamer)

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Fadari-and-Whizbang/103668596424771 

im 35 and a DAOC baby , although i did play EQ1 for awhile pugs back in DAOC were WAY different than this crap they have now with dungeon finder cross server garbage. Back then you spent time finding a group and making friends along the way and even if you wiped on something usually the group stayed around and did it right the next time. PUGS talked and chatted in dungeons back then and people actually you know played a game and enjoyed it. Come WOW and others like it , its now a bunch of young punks with smartmouths saying hurry, pull, go go go! etc . Seriously you do not know how many times I would sit back in a group thinking to myself god i wish I knew who this idiot was so i could break their jaw. But thats the mentality now, random pugs means disrespect and drama.  Dont compare SWTOR to WOW either in dungeon finder as SWTOR so far hasnt been no where near as bad as the community of wow. WOW by far is the WORST community out there for a mmo next to league of legends . TSW for not having a dungeon finder seems to be pretty decent for community pugs so far to but its brand new so we shall see. I wish the 10 mil in wow though stays in wow and doesnt come to GW2 that way i know there is a chance at a decent community.

"but there is just this level of difficulty missing when running with an organized group of players that are used to playing with one another, rather than running with players that don't know their heal abilities from their DPS ones."

I think you have this the wrong way around. It's not the level of difficulty that's missing with your guild runs. It's the level of competence missing from the PUG, making it unnecessarily difficult.

     The problem I always had in PUGs is that they would try to tackle too difficult of content.....Instead of fighting stuff they could handle fairly easily it was always "OK lets go after the world boss" or something stupid like that......Your group immediately wipes, people start pointing fingers, and your game turns into an incredibly frustrating experience......WHen you found a group that was on the same page as to what they could handle and who would handle what role, it could be alot of fun.

I've never had much fun/luck with puds, except in pre-cu SWG.

Originally posted by Fadari

I also started gaming with UO, EQ and AC and I do not, in any way believe that a 12 year old could have played UO under the conditions of that game.  You don't have the intellect, thought processes, coordination or even the wisdom/experience at 12 to stay alive long enough to chop wood.  Fanboy's may dream about following some young girl gamer, but keep it real.  Even your knowledge of WoW is limited. You seem to have no idea what raiding was like before dungeon finders were added to some games and thus the dumbing down of content so uncoordinated groups could get their loot.  Just be honest, tell us what you know and really experienced.  Maybe an action screenshot would help prove you were there, then again I suppose you can get those anywhere.  After you've finished an article/blog, maybe a spell and grammar check might be an idea too.

-Lisa (a real female gamer)

 

 

*shrug*

Maybe you weren't smart / coordinated / wise (seriously? wisdom?) enough to play UO when you were 12, but that doesn't necessarily mean that everyone else wasn't.  I've grouped and guilded with a few 13 year olds over the years that certainly knew what was what better than the average 20-something cement-head.  Not many mind you, but enough to know it's a non-zero chance.

BTW - it's pretty hillarious to have obvious grammatical errors no more than a few sentences prior to commenting on someone else's.

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Originally posted by Fadari
I also started gaming with UO, EQ and AC and I do not, in any way believe that a 12 year old could have played UO under the conditions of that game.  You don't have the intellect, thought processes, coordination or even the wisdom/experience at 12 to stay alive long enough to chop wood.  Fanboy's may dream about following some young girl gamer, but keep it real.  Even your knowledge of WoW is limited. You seem to have no idea what raiding was like before dungeon finders were added to some games and thus the dumbing down of content so uncoordinated groups could get their loot.  Just be honest, tell us what you know and really experienced.  Maybe an action screenshot would help prove you were there, then again I suppose you can get those anywhere.  After you've finished an article/blog, maybe a spell and grammar check might be an idea too.

-Lisa (a real female gamer)

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Fadari-and-Whizbang/103668596424771   

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Originally posted by Ryowulf
I've never had much fun/luck with puds, except in pre-cu SWG.

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he! he! *snicker*