Garth Agarwen

[Aleksandyr]

Nice! Im game. I certainly dont mind level difference I do see the point of being in the same level range though. At this point, ive played mostly solo, I wont quibble over level ranges. Im sure ill have plenty of opportunity to play within range. In fact id love to do Fornost this weekend with that crew

A

[timko]

Bognor will opt out of the GA quests until he can get a group of 33-41 or so. I really want to do GA straight up at least once.

(I'm not really into PvE dungeon encounters, and so I've never finished any of the major "dungeons" except the ones in the Epic line. For instance I dropped out of our lone Fornost run while only a few goblins and trolls from completing 2 quests. The rest of the group continued on and finished. But I never bothered to go back. I'm just not interested in running the same AI twice.

But I decided I'd like to complete at least one, and GA is probably it.)

Timko

[Zhongo Fuzzyfutt]

I would suggest you finish Urugarth then....Carn Dum is very long.

[Zabrak]

verewen said:

Hey Aleks, got a few names for you for GA tonight.

If you'd like to have 50s along, I would be glad to help out.

[yunkor]

little yunkgar will come

[Zabrak]

yunkor said:

little yunkgar will come

Also known as the younger Yunkgar?

[duri]

sorry about the experience in GA tonight. If I had read this thread prior to logging in with Duri and switching to Ceol when I heard about a GA group, I would have had a better idea what was up. We were coming at this from very different pespectives and goals.

I dont enjoy doing instances with higher levels. Not at all. I play this game for fun and for the challenge, not for the loot or just to do it for the sake of doing it. I appreciate that others may see it differently, and I respect that. It feels too much like just punching buttons and someone else hitting the "I win" button when we get in trouble, and that just isnt a very satisfying experience.

When I saw one level 50 in the group I had second thoughts, but when I saw the level 28s I figured well maybe it will be a challenge after all. Then the one fellow dropped and another level 50 joined, I tried to talk about it before we entered the instance, but got little response, and the response I did get was sort of a 'dont worry it will be OK'. Being a newer person in the guild, I didnt say any more.... and in hindsight maybe I should have. Not only about the group composition but also about the goals for the night.

I've probably been through most of GA ten times between beta and retail, and I was really saving ceol's experience for a good challenging group to fight our way through. In fact I hadnt levelled Ceol for a while just so he wouldnt outlevel the instance and have stuff turn grey. Just doing it for the sake of doing it, really doesnt have much appeal at this point. Between that, and the silence in fellowship chat, well maybe you understand where I am coming from.

I will be sure to ask more questions up-front next time. Sorry for the incovenience.

[Aleksandyr]

You are entitled to your opinion Duri and like i said, I wasn't offended or anything. Next time by all means speak up. If you don't like the group build then its better to drop early on than to drop later in the middle.

Either way. Challenge in this game is the norm for me. Every time I log in. Why? Because ive solo'd to here. Level 37. With the exception of help from Yngvi to heal me while doing grey Fellowship quests sometimes, and the last half of book 2 we did recently with some Pillagers and some PuG folks. Ive solo'd fellowship quests because I had no choice (or felt as such at the time) and all that. But when you get to a point where things are starting to go grey? Id rather experience the content than not. I don't mind having 50's. Is it as much of a challenge? No. Its still dangerous for the lower levels. Ask Yunkgar. He died a few times last night. But I want to read the story, see whats up, and enjoy myself with friends. Thats more important to me than being challenged.

Now don't get me wrong. Im more than willing to wade in level appropriate hell. Ive been on the beta teams and whatnot of MMOs where no one knew what to expect and it was a rush to survive and blaze a trail. So again I see your point. For me though? I just wanted to team period. Last night was a bout a group of friends doing some content and helping each other out.

The silence on fellowship was likely in PART due to the rest of us being on Ventrilo. However, I dont have a mic. So I could only hear. Even then there still wasnt a ton of stuff going back and forth. A lot of it was social. The entire evening was really laid back. We weren't coordinating a surgical strike, we were just enjoying hanging out.

I can now say ive been to Garth Argarwen once. While we didn't do everything, we did do a nice chunk and I had a good time seeing everything. Thank you to everyone that came along and helped out it was greatly appreciated and I had fun. I even completed 4-5 quests.

A

[yunkor]

I got to see Grimbark yay!
I never got to see him before. Now I just have to rescue that silly old hag and I will have seen it all.

I think people did not respond much because they assumed you read the post. As you can see Timko said he would wait for a different run to not mix levels. So people assumed if you still wanted to come anyway then it wasn't a problem for you. I know that's what I thought. I was pretty shocked when you left.

I don't know what "skipping" means when they give you keys for the express purpose of going several times, and doing only a portion of the instance each time. To me that's doing the dungeon as intended. They aren't linear like the epic quest chapters. I would never volunteer for a "full run" of any of the world dungeons, they're all far too long for me. A full GA clear could take 4 hours. While i want to see it all of it at the appropriate challenge level, i sure don't want to see it all at once!

I mean, i could go yesterday, and also go again, so it is not a big deal. I have to go a bunch of times to finish the quests, so might as well go while others are actually going!

Of course if you're there the first time you want to see it in order and not skip around, which some people pointed out regarding Uru a few months ago.

Yeah Alek i kept getting aggro due to my awesome dps! Don't tell anyone.

But levels yes, it is fun to do it as a challenge. Though I am confused when I see people say they want "33-41" when I think that's overpowered for that dungeon, everything's 29-31 or so. To me appropriate levels would average 32, not 37. That is already "too high", my first character was going to Fornost at 37 not still going to GA.

[Zabrak]

You know, I think you're both right. Main thing is open communication. We're all good here.

[duri]

well like I said Yunkor, when I joined the group there was only one level 50. When one person dropped and a second level 50 joined, I tried to talk about it, but barely anyone answered, and then folks went into the instance, and so I was standing outside by myself. I waited for a minute or so and when no one said anything, I figured I should go in.

Aleks, I did say something, I really tried to. Maybe I should have said more. Anyway, I did give it a try despite my concern, but when we took down the master elite in about 12 seconds, and bypassed the swamp/tree/human sections and were heading towards the section with the undead brothers, thats when it became obvious to me.

I was real careful in my first post to say that I respect that other people have different points of view, and I am not saying that my way is the right way. But like I said, I have been to GA ten times over the last year, so it had become pretty routine to me, and I was saving this experience for Ceol so that it would be a fun challenge... and fresh, since its been a few months since Duri was there.

Like norel said, good communication will help. These instances can sap up hours of time, and its probably a good idea to spend a few minutes and talk about what we're planning. That way, if people have questions about the group or the goals or the loot allocation or whatever, everyone gets their questions answered and we all know whats going on at the outset. If we have questions or comments like that again, lets make a point to ask them, and ask again if we have to... and if we hear someone asking questions, lets make time to answer them.

[Freesia]

duri said:

Like norel said, good communication will help. These instances can sap up hours of time, and its probably a good idea to spend a few minutes and talk about what we're planning. That way, if people have questions about the group or the goals or the loot allocation or whatever, everyone gets their questions answered and we all know whats going on at the outset. If we have questions or comments like that again, lets make a point to ask them, and ask again if we have to... and if we hear someone asking questions, lets make time to answer them.

To be honest, Duri, that's what these forums are for, and also, a lot of our discussions take place in Ventrilo. We have a lot of people who have issues using the game voice chat (can't hear them, they're too loud, etc) and Ventrilo solves 90% of those problems.

This discussion you are wanting to have had prior to the instance -did- take place prior to the instance (I wasn't even there, or planning on going, and I knew that the 'which levels are going to go and are we all OK with that' conversation had taken place). Your missing the conversation doesn't mean it didn't occur, and acting like its everyone else's fault that you didn't read the thread really isn't fair.

In a kinship as large as this one, you're going to need to hook yourself in to our established modes of communication, rather than expect the kinship to change how it does things in the broader sense. I'm sorry if that sounds harsh, I'm not really meaning it like that. I mean that you are going to need to read these forums. We discuss pretty much everything that's "planned" here, in the threads provided for that purpose, every week. The random, hey let's do something as a group, stuff.. those discussions are 90% of the time going to take place on Ventrilo, and I really would suggest that you get the client, set it up, and join in the banter.

All that said. One thing Pillagers DON'T do is bail in the middle of something without making arrangements with the group for someone to either take our place, or just see if it's OK because you really need to go. I logged on to Vent about 2 seconds after you left the instance, and the rest of the fellowship was completely flabbergasted. I understand that it wasn't working how you thought it needed to work, but there needs to be a conversation about that. I imagine one of the 50s might have volunteered to drop, if they knew how much it bothered you. The reason for planning the outing was so that someone who had never even seen GA, and who rarely gets to group with kin, could do both those things. That it wasn't aligned with your personal preferences is unfortunate, but really, you ought to be apologizing for the way you left the group, not apologizing that you didn't read a thread that was posted well in advance of the outing.

F

[Delaney]

Thread being locked by Zhongo's request.